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Formula USA/Lockhart-Phillips Unlimited Superbike Series Round S: Road America STORY AND PHOTOS BY HENNY RAY ABRAMS ELKHART LAKE, WI, AUG. 4 .ometime between the end of IfII) Lockhart-Phillips Unlimited Superbike qualifying on Saturday and the start of racing on Sunday, the track slowed down, as did most of the riders - Arclight Suzuki's Craig Connell among them. Connell had qualified second (2: 13.228) to Hooters/Mountain Dew Suzuki's Larry Pegram, his time .6 of a second slower, but Connell wasn't worried. He was certain Pegram wouldn't be able to sustain that pace - it was done with a soft tire . and he was just as certain the pace would be closer to his time than the 2: 12.623 of Pegram. He was right, but the time was even slower than he'd imagined. Pegram said part of the difference was temperature: Sunday was much warmer than Saturday qualifying. "I thought, even with the temperature, I could run 13s and I was riding as hard as I could and the times were way slower," Pegram said. "I'm like, 'What am I doing? Why am I slow?' The first laps that I led it was like 14.9s, and I know I was going through all the corners as good as I was the other times. Then, once we got to the straightaways, I figured out something's wrong with this thing, just try to get it home." Another part of the problem may have been the torrential rains that 28 AUGUST 14, 2002' cue • e swept through the area early Sunday morning, cleaning rubber off the track. "I felt, coming out of the carousel, my grip was nowhere near as good as it was yesterday," Connell said. "So I think the rain probably was a great contributor to slower lap times. "Yesterday, I could run consistent mid 13s and I thought that's where the race would be today, so I was pretty happy with what I was able to do," Connell said. "But like Larry, I was a little surprised in the first race. I was very surprised that the pace was what it was. In that one, I was able to (Above) Larry Pegram (72) gets the jump on the field at Road America. Pegram's teammate Michael Barnes Is tucked In behind the Ohioan, with eventual race winner Craig Connell (6) and defending series champion Shawn Higbee (1) also in pursuit. (Right) Connell won both legs of the Formula USA Unlimited Superblke race. n e vw s go a little bit quicker, but still not as Connell won again in the second quick, as good, as what I thought we were going to do." ' leg, his victory more decisive - 2.511 seconds over Barnes with Pegram In the first leg, Pegram and Con- third, his Suzuki GSX-R750 on the nell took turns leading as late as the final lap, Connell inching by Pegram verge of expiring after it blew a head gasket late in the race and spit all at the line to win by .043 of a second, of the coolant out by the end. the lap times well off those from Haskovec moved up to fourth, Saturday. Millennium Technologies' right behind Pegram, with Higbee Shawn Higbee raced by Hooters/ Mountain Dew Suzuki's Michael spooked by Pegram's mist and slowing to fifth. Barnes at the line for fifth, with SGl's Connell's double win meant that he left Wisconsin with a 23-point championship lead, 161-138, over Vincent Haskovec recovering from an early, near-disastrous incident to take fifth.