Cycle News - Archive Issues - 2000's

Giovanni Busse! (1 15 ) holds off Miguel Duhamel (17) and Mladln In Saturday's final. M ladln worked his way past both riders to take the win. Bussei, meanwhile, ended up making a m istake that cost h im second and third p la ce. my Own Race l aturday_ 1] 1] @ Giovanni Bussei 4th Du cati Austin's Giova nni Bussei let a sure second pl ace slip awa y with a rooki e mistake. A pproach ing the fini sh line for the fi nal lap , Bussei saw the flag m an and what he thought was the che cke red flag waving by his side. In fact it was still in the stand, Bu ssei said , and he j ust m isread the situation. He had slowed down and opened his visor when fi rst Miguel DuH am el the n Ben Bostrom cam e fly ing past . By the n he k new what was up and salvaged fou rt h place . " I' m very sorry fo r th e team," a con trite Bu ssei sa id . "(Migue l) DuHam el passed m e, and I thoug ht he was slowing dow n. [Ben) Bostrom passed m e, and I realized it was m aybe something else," Up until his faux pas , he said it was certainly his best race . Th e cha nge the team made made it more sta ble on the bra kes . "W e had a big problem at Mid ·Ohio on the brakes. Th e bike is very fast in the co rne r, but the bike is no t so good on brak ing. So now we worked a litt le b it on that. It 's not so easy to ride, but at least the way to pass is a littl e better." 1] @1] Jordan Szoke 5th k now wh at? T h a t' s r a cin g ," Duhamel B o st r o m w a s a f r u strated t hird sa id . " A n d M at [M la d in] was ab le to aft er B u sse i' s m isc u e . S ince coming do it, an d h e w o n , and th at ' s how it b a c k t o th e A M A se ries, B o st rom ' s Corona Extra EB SCO Media Suzuki's Jordan Szoke fin ished fifth for the second race in a ro w, fi rst privat eer, with a points bounty th at m oved him to ninth in the cham pionship . Szoke had an event ful beginning. Th e water temperature on his Suzuki GSX-RIOOO rock eted to 212 degrees on the start li ne. On the seco nd lap he went int o turn one to fin d Yoshimura Suzuk i's Mat Mladi n running off onto th e gras s. Ml adin was behin d Szoke for a lap before taki ng ov er sixth . "I thought I was going well, and into th e corkscrew thi ng over th ere I was at angle sliding in, and I thought th is was great, and Mat [Mladin l wen t around th e outs ide of m e. He's got his bik e worki ng , and he can pu t it where he wants." Szok e sett led int o sixth after losing touch with th e others, incl uding Ducati A usti n's Giovann i Bussei. "Once I got going , obv iously I lost to uch with Bussei and couple of guys and had g o es. H e d e serv ed it . I j u st cou ld n 't r e sul t s h aven 't b e en wh a t h e o r t h e to run m y own race ." a nd I co u ldn' t get by hi m , a nd you goi ng in turn one an d turn seven ." g et m y self t og eth er to g et b y , an d h e t e a m ex pec ted , and h e ad mi ts i t. was j u s t r idin g a b it o f a w id e b i k e T o da y , h e w a s hi s ty p ica l ca ndi d se l f. Th e battle for th e pole went to the chec kered flag and beyond, with Yoshim ura Suzuki 's Aa ron Yates and Mat M lad in swa ppin g it bac k and forth three ti mes in the last two m in utes. Yates earned it in the end, even though Ml adin disagreed. What was im po rta nt was th e fin al result, and the po int that went wit h it, along with a chance to test ti res. Yates had cr ashed on Friday - a fro nt -end washo ut - and wasn't co m fortab le on the bike. But as the end of the hour approached, he got faster and faster, holding th e fast tim e then lo sing it then taking it back on his final tour of the 2.225-mile Virg in ia Int ernational Raceway No rth Cou rse. Yates ' fi nal time was a 1:2 5.0 7 1, which he needed to knock back Mladin and his 1:2 5.304 , turn ed on his final lap. Mladin thought that Yates had started his last lap afte r th e che ck ered flag ha d fall en, but the AMA clocks show ed tha t he'd begun it wi th 13 seconds to spare. "If it would have been ou t, I would have saw it," Yates said of the flag . "b ecause we alm ost hi t the lfl agm an] out there." The point that goes with the po le closed Yates' gap on Mladin to 32 poi nts in adva nce of Satu rday 's Sup erbik e race, the first of the doubleheade r week end at the Suzuki lightning Nati onals. But Yates said he wasn't go ing to take any unnecessary risk s in pursuit of the titl e. "This year I've been struggling 'a bit with the bi ke ; I haven' t reall y been able to ride it like I want ," Yates said, "reall y push it , especially getti ng int o the tum on the brak es. Th e changes we m ade yesterday, the bike feels a lot better. " Th ere were spots where Yates was struggling th at Ml adi n had wired, and Yates knew it. "There's a lo t of tim e in j ust those couple of spo ts, and that' s where Mat's [Mladinl always had a little adva ntage on m e; he really holds th e gas on longer and then just slams on the brak es and gets it turned in ," Yates said . "When yo u' re going tha t fast , you 're really covering a lot of ground ." Th ere was only so m uch ground to cover before yo u ca me up on a lapper rider. The VIR layout is m ost ly one li ne, with slowe r riders the bane of the fast pa ck . "There was a lot of traffi c out there," M1adin said , a common refrain during the week end. "It' s hard t o get a good lap in . I did m y best lap on the thi rd lap or fourth lap on that tire, so it' s obv iously no t the best co nditions for that tire." Mladin said he did enough to kno w what was happ ening with his tires . "It looks li ke there's one really good tire," Mladin said of the harder Dunl op. " Every one can use it. When it's hot li ke th is, it' s go ing to be greasy . We'r e going to ha ve to wait and see what happens," Erio n Hon da's Ku rt is Roberts was thi rd fastes t at 1:25.7 02 wit h American Honda 's Miguel Du Ham el turning in his best lap of the weeke nd to fill out the front row wit h a lap of 1:25.29 5. Roberts had sk ip ped the recent test at Daytona bec ause of his sore shoulder , but DuHam el fel t he'd benefited. "My shou lde r has b een prett y sor e," Rob er t s sai d of th e injury h e su ffe red in a mo tocross inju ry early in the season . "It' s been a long season on it , and the more days I do it, the lon ger it ta ke s to come back. I know this rac etrack , and I obviously could have come here and tested , but at the sam e time, to co me back here wh en I'm sore, I'm not going to race, no poi nt . I just figured we sit out and come back here for the race ." As for tires, Roberts said : "Th e tire situation cou ld be bett er, like we're all saying . It looks lik e we'll all end up on the same tir e and see' who can keep it und er them the best. " DuHamel said the test provided a baseline fro m wh ich they m ade adjustments that paid off. "The bike's working good," he said. "I was p rett y surprised with that lap because I kin d of m essed up my do wnhill , the left -hander on th e way dow n. I charged in too m uch, and I almost went off the track ." DuH am el' s time was considerably quicker th an on Frid ay , when he admitted to a lack of effo rt. "Yeste rday, I wasn 't really trying th at hard - it wa s so hot ," he said . "And I figured today m ight be coo ler. It wasn't m aybe m uch cooler, bu t that' s wha t I was thinking . Today I was reall y thinking that everyone was going to go a little faster, and I had to go faste r m yself, obv iously . A t the end I got a clea n lap , the 25 .9 - that was a clean lap . Did a 26 .3 , som e low 26s ," Th en came Ducati A ustin 's Giovanni Bu ssei, in his first trip to VIR, follo wed by Attack Suzuki's J ason Pridmor e, the priv at eer Suzuk i rider in fro nt of the factory Hond a RC51 of Ben Bostrom . Corona Extra EBSCO Med ia Suzuk i's Jordan Szok e fil led out the seco nd row, his best qua lifying pos it ion to date. @@ Aa ron Yates 6th From the very start Yoshim ura Suzuk i's Aaron Yates was doom ed. Th e same clutch prob lem that sideli ned him in the first race at Road Am erica cropped up agai n right off the start. "When it started doin g it because I was trying to go , and it started sli pping, and I was bar ely babyin g th e gas and trying to keep it at tha t point where it was slip p ing and right on th e edge, " Yates said. "I really didn't thi nk it was goi ng to make it to the end, but it hung in the re. I was just wai li ng around everybody as good as I cou ld trying to be smooth and ca rry ing m y m oment um," A lac k of adju stability force d Yates to use a tall firs t gear, putting additiona l stress on the clu tch. Th e only rem ed y for Sund ay wa s to pu t stiffer sp rings in it , he said. 1] 1] cB Shawn Higbee 1] ®® Geoff May 7th Team Millennium Ka ufm an Suzuki's Shawn Higb ee had the benefit of a new Show a fork and Niss in brakes. Even th ough they weren 't dialed in , they were a big im provem ent. But the re were other m echa nical bits tha t slow ed his drive . Just as Higbee st arted to get into a rhythm , he had some brake fade. "We' re trying som e new brakes this week end, and that' s the first time we'v e been on th em for that long of a duration in thos e co ndition , and I think we didn't bleed them well eno ugh and had som e air tha t came out, so that wa s dis ap pointin g to have to deal with th al..A nd the n th e electr ic shift broke on us. Jus t the additi on al wor k of having to m anuall y shift and deal with th e brak e fade was a task out the re." Higbee was m ostl y around eig ht h place, m ov ing up to seven th when Kurtis Roberts went out with tire problem s. "When the brakes were work ing, they were working awe some. They 're phenom enal when the lever's there." Higbee said the Sho wa fork gives him a " lit ti e more feel, and they 'r e a lot stiffer than the prod uction forks. We've had the m on for two sessions . Th ey 'r e not di aled in yet, and we're alrea dy going faster than the stoc k stuff. A nd Ke vin got a longer swingarrn for this week end . We're getti ng it piec e by piec e and p retty happy with the pace we'r e runn ing." 8th Team Em bry 's Geoff May is from Alpharetta, Georgia , but even he wasn't prepared for Sat urda y 's heat and humidity . According to Accuweather, the tempera ture was only 90 deg rees with 57 -pe rce nt humi dity , but it felt far worse. "I don't think I' ve ever been th is worn out in m y rife," May said, recovering in fro nt of a pair of fans in his pit afte r th e rac e. "We haven 't had to race in anyt hing near th is hot all year, and I have n't raced anywhere in the south, and I'm not in the best co ndition. I was fighting the bike, and the tires went off so bad towards the end bec ause of the heat. Th ey got reall y greasy. Slide, go into the co rner, tuc k the front and the n com e out and then smoke the rear tire co m ing off the co mer and fighting that and try ing to m uscle it arou nd and trying to hit my apexes and stuff j ust wo re me out . A bout six laps to go I felt li ke I was going to thro w up every time I cam e do wn the straightaway. My brain , it went to m ush. I co uldn' t focus or put any thoughts together, and (Shawn I Higbee got back by m e. We had a goo d race back and forth . He did a hell of a job ." things work ing ." "The b ike ' s g re a t ; th e bik e ' s fan- W h en M lad in c am e past, B o st ro m ta sti c . T hi s w as ri der erro r ," he said. "It's a prob lem I've g ot t o fix , an d I'll was at his limit. fi x it thi s w inter. " " I saw him g o b y , j ust gave him a H a v ing n ot r u n up fr o n t most o f li t tl e w ave, and cia o, " Bostrom said . the se a son , h e wa s h ap py t o b e at t h e " I k new h e wa s c o m i n g, a nd I was fron t. T h en a v ib r at ion set in , a nd h is trying t o w at ch w ha t was going o n up fro nt a n d see i f h e was go ing t o take hands w ent to slee p . " I wa s st ill giving i t a ll I got, " h e t h e se boys . I saw t he s p e eds go i ng said. "When you ca n 't feel t he han- out o f th e r e . A nd M ig uel [D u h a m e l ] d lebars , i t ' s a bit scary. I w a s st i ll w a s m ix ed up w it h G io v anni [B ussei ]. p u sh in g h ard a nd t r y in g , and these I didn 't expect h im to w in from about guy s j u st o u trode u s tod a y a n d h a d 10 t h , you kn ow ." eye I e n e _ S S EPTEM BER 1 0, 2003 11

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