MvOwN
155
RACE
Ben Bostrom
4th/5th
On Saturmy, American Honda's Ben
Bostrom had the same compound rear
tire as race wimer Miguel Duhamel
and runner-up Mat Mladin, but it was a
different construction. jake Zemke had
the same rear as Bostrom. Bostrom
ran in second n the earlyruming
before being passed, frst by Mladin,
then Duhamel, then Zemke. It was a
problem from the start, and he had little drive oil the comers. '" knew we
were in trouble because Icouldn't get a drive to pass [Eric Bostrom) on the
straightaway," Ben Bostromsaid about his earlystruggles. "When the
other guyscame by. Ifollowed them. """'d seem to maketime on the
entries and lose it on the exit. That's usuallya sign of trouble toward the
end of the race. It'll be faster tomorrow." Bostrom also Ihought he may
have stretched the rear chain,as he had in Daytona. "On the straightaway
we had a lot of rn Suzuki's Aaron Yates and Attack Kawasaki's J Hayes
osh
dropped out. Sundayended his string of sixths when he finished seventh,
again by himself. He was ;rN;rf like a shot on Sunday, then let the factory
rideB come by and madea rookie rristake with a backshift. "I guess there
was a lot of stuff behind me, but pretty uneventful again. It's just good to be
down here testing because I'm really worly into
AMA racing costs aro und $25,000. Picotte
tho ught he had a deal with Diablo , th e
Canadian pain tball compa ny, to do six AMA
races, but D iablo pulled t he plug after Daytona and never paid him , Pico tt e said . T he
deal came toge the r just before D ayt ona,
and Picotte didn't have time to paint his
Yamahas in D iab lo colors. After the race,
they told him they were disappointed that
the bike s weren't properly branded . "I
never got a dime back from them," he said .
Stewart's Yamaha R6 was well down on
power on the rest of the Formula Xtreme
field, "Th e y' re basically stock motorcycles:
Pico tt e said . O hlins had helped with the
suspension. "It's definitely a soft Supersport." Picott e was on St ewart 's back-up
bike in case Stewart showed up to ride on
Friday. Stewart did show up, with a soft
brace on his wrist, unable to ride. " I'm trying to win , but I don't think it's going to be
possible: Picott e said. " It' s more like
Continued on poge 16
CYCLE NEWS •
JU NE 16 , 2 004
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