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World Superbike Championship Round S: Silverstone r!1l®(J{}@} @[IjJ[j)@W3(J)@[f'(J uDD@ @@[Ji)@]@[J@[J[}0 !l3[J@rJDD@rns It would have been comical, had it not been so dangerous to men and machines - and championship aspirations. Already started in somewhat slippery conditions, and with rain starting soon after the lights went green through the gloom, the Supersport boys were falling by the wayside. One rider never made the start, but 33 others did and, depending on what finish we're talking about, 25 riders made the last lap. Not the scheduled last lap (the 19th), but the actual one, which turned out to be the unlucky 13th - unless you were James Whitham, Paolo Casoli, Jorg Teuchert or any of the other fallers on that fated lap. Whitham's spirited ride through the field in the early laps nonetheless delivered him the win at his home circuit, despite falling from his Yamaha machine on the 14th lap while in a lonely lead. Seconds before he fell, he had witnessed his teammate Casoli crash, shortly after he had taken a wide line into a left-hander. Teuchert was another faller at this point, having just passed another slower rider and opened the throttle a millimeter. The Yamaha Motor Germany rider was relieved to have his crash discounted from the final results, and to have passed his longtime race rival lain Macpherson (Ten Kate Honda) just prior to the finish line. Aquaplaning out of contention, he was actually sliding on his back as the red flags came out - and he even noticed them mid-slide! With a sudden increase in the steadily falling rain, and an obvious sudden increase in the danger to all from aquaplaning, the red flags were brought out not a moment too soon, and results were therefore taken from the previous lap, which had been headed by Whitham, from Casoli. According to Race Director Roberto Nosetto, "five riders fell in the space of one minute and we had to put out the flags immediately." Few would argue with the action taken, although several riders stated that they thought it should have been stopped sooner. "You can't call it a race in conditions like that: Whitham said. "I thought at the start it was my best chance of a good result with it being wet, but in my heart I wanted a dry race. With three laps to go, it was not fit to race in the conditions. On the straight, there was so much surface water, and some of it was deep. When a 600 is spinning-up down the straights, something is not right - and we're not talking about a 180bhp Superbike, we're talking a 130bhp 600. The conditions at the end made it so easy to crash; any sort of mistake and you're off. It was so unpredictable and we shouldn't have been racing. When I crashed, I remounted and saw five or six riders all pulling their bikes out the gravel and thought, 'they've got to stop this.' You've go to take race wins however they come." Third place went to Karl Muggeridge on his Honda UK machine, a rider who had found personal fitness, machine reliability and engine power all at one time sometime around Monza. Macpherson fmished fifth, a good result for a rider who is rebuilding confidence in his own abilities, and had the lesser of two tire options fitted. The top Suzuki rider was once more Katsuaki Fujiwara, who took sixth place on his A1stare machine, adding to a good run of results in his quiet, almost anonymous manner. For the 2002 season's big Supersport three, Stephane Chambon (Alstare Suzuki), Andrew Pitt (Eckl Kawasaki) and Fabien Foret (Ten Kate Honda) the Silverstone race was a sudden wake-up call to the fragility of their positions. Not this week maybe, but another couple of events like this and things may be not so dearly in favor of the triple Superpowers. Foret proved to be the top fmisher of the three championship leaders, scoring a seventh place: Chambon was one behind in eighth, but kept his championship lead thanks to Foret's inability to capitalize and Pitt's personal pain. The worst-placed of the championship leaders proved to be Pitt, who fell from his Kawasaki machine on lap 10 and scored no points, trying to pass both riders in one go. Diego Guigovaz (GiMotorsport) took ninth, with relative WSS newcomer Matthieu Lagrive taking the last top-10 slot. Christian Kellner crashed mid-race but still managed to score an 11th place, his machine only bent but not broken. He was struggling with his sore shoulder but was sitting in the top 10 before he fell. Stefano Crucianio took his Yamaha to 12th, and the top finishing Ducati was ridden by Gianluca Nannelli, into 13th place. Local rider Stuart Easton, Hislop's Monstermob Ducati Supersport·dass teammate, fell off, despite being one of the few riders to have experience of the full Silverstone circuit during the previous weekend's Endurance and British Championship race. Behind the leading trio, the World Championship positions were shaken up by the day's sodden events. Chambon leads on 96, Foret on 93, Pitt on 83 but the big winner was podium finisher Casoli, who now has 60, Fujiwara is on 59, with Whitham jumping up to 55. Christian Kellner heads his teammate Teuchert by a mere two points, 52-50. The next round takes place at Lausitzring on June 9, and if it was as wet as last year's event, it will still only be half as wet as Silverstone proved to be. Exciting maybe, but the overriding memory will be of sodden misery and crashes. 30 JUNE 5, 2002' CUe • EO n EO _ S "It was good to have a race with Neil, but he had the championship to think of and I didn't," said the delighted greenie. "I was hoping Xaus would do his normal and I was looking for the yellow flags on the last few laps, but it wasn't to be. Mega result. n Hodgson and he had shared some tactile track space during the middle laps, of what was another full-distance event, with the British crowd remembering their great 2000-season rivalry. No love is lost between the two, but it has been a long time since Walker beat Hodgson in any kind of fair fight. Byrne underlined his strong recent credentials with a fifth-place finish in race two. He even had the nerve to complain about his own English weather, and sound like riding World Superbike was an everyday occurrence. "Not as good a result as j'd have hoped in race one, but I stayed on and got it home. It was probably the worst race of my life. I'm frozen." He carried on, regarding race two. "When I caught Walker and Hodgson, I just couldn't see anything, so I dropped back to work out where I could pass safely. There wasn't quite as much water on the track this time Still the dominant rider In the series, Troy Bayliss did little to hamper his run toward the World Superblke Championship. and I had more feel from the better front tire I chose for this race. n Juan Borja roared to seventh, ahead of Bostrom, Toseland and Haga, who also made a bad race-two tire gamble, like Hodgson. For a race meeting that almost had to be canceled, the Superbikes at Silverstone were exciting, and ultimately improved as a spectacle for the watching public by all the uncertainties about the rain, tire choice and all other manner of imponderables. One thing was certain again, though; Bayliss out-rode everybody again today, even himself a couple of times, and is displaying an uncanny ability to score points no matter what. Nine wins out of 12, and a worst finish of fifth - the story is clear enough, even if Edwards is riding almost as immaculately as his fleeing quarry. Nonetheless, Bayliss maintains a healthy lead in the World Championship, with 260 points to Edwards' 231. Hodgson is an unclear third, way back on 157, ahead of Haga on 129 and Xaus on 120. CJII