Cycle News - Archive Issues - 2000's

changed before the first wheel was turned. Three Honda riders were penalized for various equipment violations (See Briefly). Bruce Transportation Group's Marty Craggill was disqualified after qualifying third, and American Honda's Miguel DuHamel and Jake Zemke were put to the back row of the grid. They were found to have nonstandard oil pressure relief valves. With the Supersport race coming immediately after the 40-lap Superbike race because of an earlier rain shower, DuHamel opted not to put any more stress on his still recovering broken collarbone. This race, like all but one on the rain-plagued day, was both redflagged and shortened. The distance was changed from 28 to 20 laps, since it ran immediately after the late afternoon Superbike race. The red flag came on the second lap, but not before it could change the fortune of at least two riders. Erion Honda's Zemke was one of them. He found himself on the ground on the first lap with no explanation. "Some guy just cleaned me out from behind," Zemke said of the shunt in the turn four right-hander. Zemke made the restart, but on a damaged motorcycle. Tech Star Industries' Thad Halsmer was the other, the Yamaha rider's crash on the banking bringing out the red flag The Yamaha factory four got away at the start. Kawasaki's Tommy Hayden tried to stay with them, the task becoming increasingly more difficult as the race wore on. He would drop back to a secure fifth. Out front Buckmaster passed teammate Aaron Gobert for the lead and was fronting the blue quartet when Hacking, who'd taken over second on the fourth lap, made his move in turn three. Buckmaster went from first to fourth, Gobert slotted into second, with DiSalvo third. The order of the first five was set. "You got to do whatever you can to pass around here," Hacking said. "I was riding kind of like a girl, just because I was a little tentative from what I did there last year, lost it on the front. On the brakes I wasn't too good down there, and that one lap I reeled (Buckmaster) and I knew I was faster than him it seemed like, but the only place I could pass him was on the brakes. That's the only place you can pass here. Our bikes are so equal - they run the same; they do everything the same." Gobert said he tried everything he could to get by Hacking but never found the opening. "The problem was you had to be so close that rubbing wheels to try and set someone up here, and to get that close without risking touching, was hairy," Gobert said. "And that one lap I said, 'Well I'm going to risk it right now, and that's it; I'll do the best I can.' Smoked the tire all the way out of two, all the way down into three, got next to him, but smoking the tire like that as soon as I touched the gas, the thing went sideways; it wasn't going to run down into fourth. That was it. Didn't have anything left after that. I thought hopefully there'll be a mistake, or a lapped rider will balk Jamie (Hacking), and I'll get the both of them, anything that could just give me the win, but it didn't happen." Hacking and Gobert had a slight gap on DiSalvo, who said he could stick with his teammates but couldn't make the pass. "I'm glad I was where I was and did the things I did and stuck with these guys," DiSalvo said. "It was pretty hairy a couple of times. They got away, and I had to put my head down and really, really ride to my limits to get them back to where I could just be right here and almost have a shot at passing one of them. I could catch back up them, but I couldn't pass them." Hacking moved into the points lead with 154, 10 more than Buckmaster, with Gobert third at 142 and DiSalvo the fourth Yamaha at 128. eN Pike's Peak International Raceway Fountain, Colorado Results: June 1, Z003 [Round 51 PRO HONDA OILS SUPERSPORT, I. Jam;e Hacking (Yam): 2. Aaron Gobert (Yam); 3. Jason DiSalvo (Yam); 4. Damon Buckmaster (Yam); 5. Tommy Hayden (Kaw); 6. Ben Spies (Suz); 7. Jake my own RACE (I)td,td, 5th Tommy Hayden "I'm having a hard time with those boys right now," Kawasaki's Tommy Hayden said. Hayden was with the Yamaha quartet for much of the race before fading as the race progressed. "I was riding there with them for a while. I was kind of just holding on, letting them pull me around a little bit. I didn't really have anything for them. It was pretty much alii could do just to stay right there on the tail end of them. I caught a couple of good breaks in traffic. And then at the end I caught a couple of guys, and they stretched it out. They picked the pace up a little bit, too, the last couple of laps. They stepped it up, and I didn't have nothing to step up." (I)@® Jake Zemke 7th The Erion Honda rider made the most of a bad situation. Relegated to the back row of the grid for an equipment violation (See Briefly), Zemke hit his second patch of bad luck when he was knocked down on the first lap of the race. The fall broke his handlebar, footpeg and shifter, but a subsequent red flag allowed the team to make repairs. There were still problems, including his front brakes and the shortening of the race. With the distance 20 laps, instead of the original 28, Zemke had less time to make up for lost ground. "I lost my brake adjuster so my brakes had totally faded. With five or six laps to go they were coming all the way to the bar. My shifter was too low, and I couldn't feel my downshift, so I'd downshift, and I couldn't tell what gear I was in. It was a big old mess. We were still able to run all the way back up to seventh. Who knows what would have happened?" (I)td, 1] 1] Pascal Picotte 8th The French-Canadian came to the lower 48 mostly as a test, knowing his horsepowerrestricted Canadian spec Yamaha R6 was well down on power to the AMA regulars. At the end of the day, he'd netted an eighth and plenty of seat time. though he was running with a rougher crowd than normal. "A couple of guys were trying to win the race on the first couple of laps and just blocking the line and bumping each other, so the lead group just took off, nothing you could do after that," Picotte said. "I had a good race with Jake (Zemke) at the end. That was kind of fun to race with someone who knows how to do it. He would leave me room. I would leave him room. I knew what to expect from him." Not so for his meetings with Yoshimura Suzuki's Ben Spies. "He was trying to play dirty. I was on the inside, and he let the brake go and took my front wheel, so I let the brake go and bumped him back. I was like, 'Hey, you don't do that to me.' Because I've been there, done that. After that I was going in the kink, and I was on the inside so I had the line, and he just went on me. Nothing to do, so I just bumped him again. That kind of sucked because we could have worked together and probably closed the gap with the lead group instead of blocking each other. I don't like to race that way. That's not the kind of racing I like." (I) 1] 1] Ben Spies 6th The Yoshimura Suzuki rider showed up after the race with a black mark on the back thigh of his leathers, the evidence of a coming-to with Pascal Picotte. "He stuffed me going into three, so I come up underneath him, and we go through the righthand horseshoe," Spies said. "He tried to outbrake me and run wide so I'd go up inside of him. We go to that right kink, he's still there. I throw it in the left, and he's still there, and he wasn't in front me. If I stood it up, I was running off the track. so I laid into him. It was his fault. I wasn't letting off for him." Spies spent much of the race alone after passing Erion Honda's Alex Gobert near the halfway mark. By then, the leaders were long gone. "Alex (Gobert) I guess got tired, started fading. Then I just got behind Tony (Meiring). He was riding good. I don't know if I'd have been able to get around him, but I guess he hit a false neutral going into one and went around him, and from then on it was just lappers." Zemke (Hon); 8. Pascal Picotte (Yam); 9. Alex Gobert (Hon); 10. Jamie Stauffer (Suz): II. Tony Meiring (Kaw); 12. Doug Chandler (Hon); 13. Roger Lee Hayden (Hon); 14. Chris Peris (Hon); 15. Craig Connell (Han); 16. Jason Curtis (Hon); 17. Hector Romero (Yam); 18. Martin Sims (Suz); 19. Dirk Sanchez (Kaw): 20. Shaun Summers (Suz): 21. Terry Skogen (Yam): 22. David Lambert (Suz); 23. Quentin Wilson (Yam): 24. Darin Scherer (Yam); 25. Chris Lowe (Suz); 26. David Guy (Suz); 27. Jeff Grace (Yam); 28. Will Sequino (Yam); 29. Torsten Zorn (SUI); 30. Heath Small (Yam); 31. M;chael Applehans (Suz); 32. Adam Scott (Suz); 33. Mark Ledesma (Hon); 34. Thad Halsmer (Yam). Time: 18 min., 49.560 sec. Distance: 20 laps, 26.30 miles Average speed: 83.8 mph Margin of victory: 0.288 sec. PRO HONDA OILS SUPERSPORT C'SHIP POINT (I){§)@ Tony Meiring 11th Kawasaki's Tony Meiring was running behind teammate Tommy Hayden until an error in turn one put him back in the pack. Meiring said he was going into turn one when his foot hit the ground and accidentally put the ZX-6RR into neutral. "That's when everybody got by me. Because I had to come to a full stop. I put it in so deep, It just kind of drifted, so I had to go around (the banking), stop and go. I ended up three or four back. We're going to get them in the 750 class," he said, presciently. STANDINGS (After 5 of 11 rounds): 1. Jt:lmie Hacking (154/3 wins); 2, Damon Buckmaster (144); 3. Aaron Gobert (142); 4. Jason DiSalvo (128); 5. Jake Zemke (126); 6. Tommy Hayden (123); 7. Ben Sp;es (117); 8. Alex Gobert (108); 9. Dou9 Chandler Lockhart-Phillips USA Formula Extreme sprint, the Australian jumped out to the lead, then held off a furious lastlap challenge from fellow Aussie Adam Fergusson of the Corona Extra EBSCO Media Suzuki team to win his first Formula Xtreme race of the year. "We probably gambled," Buckmaster said after beating Fergusson Round 4: Pikes Peak International Raceway STORY AND PHOTOS BY HENNY RAY ABRAMS FOUNTAIN, CO, MAY 31 D amon Buckmaster won the twicered-flagged Lockhart-Phillips USA Formula Xtreme race by saving (99): 10. Tony Meiring (96); II. Roger Lee Hayden (82); 12. Jason Curt;s (67); 13. (TIE) M;guel DuHamel/Ty Howard (65); 15. Jamie Stauffer (63); 16. Chris Peris (59); 17. (TIE) Craig Connell/Thad Halsmer (44); 19. Marty Cragg;H (38). his tires, literally. Tire management The race was twice stopped by red was always going to be an issue for the 29-lap Formula Xtreme race at Pike's Peak International Raceway, but it was how the Graves Motorsports Yamaha rider saved his tires that made the difference. flags, with the front-runners able to change tires after the first stoppage. By the second stoppage many of the top runners had run out of wheels or tires. Not Buckmaster. Able to fit fresh rubber for the final 12-lap cycle by 0.108 seconds late on a cool afternoon. "Our strategy was to preserve as many tires as we could and keep as much up our sleeve as we could. It played to our advantage." Up until the final run Fergusson had been strong. He'd first taken the n e 1M os • JUNE 1 1, 2003 15

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