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we were both on the limits pretty good. I
know I was, for sure."
Roge r Lee cro ssed the line in front and
was there when the race was finally called.
Nathan Dress man had crashed in the le ft
before the Keyho le. He struggled to get off
the track, but his bike was an impediment.
"Y always want to get it over with,"
ou
Roger Lee said of his third win of the season .
This one closed the gap on his brother
Tommy to 13 points, 293 to 280, with two
,Briefly...
Continued from page 25
weekend in his off-MotoGP season. It had
him riding a second Ducati Austin bike at
the final two rounds of the AMA Chevrolet
Superbike Championship. But a cursory
glance at the schedule reveals that both
rounds , at Road Atlanta and VIR, conflict
with MotoGP races, first in Portugal then
japan . Since his fathe r is contracted to have
two riders on the grid, it's unlikely he'd give
his youngest son a busman's holiday in the
American South . "That's news to me,"
Terry Gregoric ka, the Ducati Austin team
owner, said. Gregoricka said all decisions
abo ut riders were made by Paolo Ciabattl,
Ducati's chief for AMAand World Superbike. If Roberts was foisted on the team ,
the team would receive bikes, engines, and
a vastly increased workload. Gregoricka
said the team would like to have a second
rider to help with the deve lopment load.
Roberts lent the tiniest meas ure of cre dence to the rumor by parading around
LagunaSeca in the gear of Parts Unlimited,
the company that sponsors the Ducati
Austin team .
races to run.
"I didn't need fo r two people to get
between me and Rog," Tommy said after
finishing fourth.
In between came Spies, who was 0.263
seconds back, and Aaron Gobert, 3.2 seconds behind Spies.
"It's no fun, seeing how our Superstoek
race was like that, and then this race," Spies
said. "Roger was going to win the race
either way, but still it's under a red flag. It's
just the conditions were pretty sucky. But
that's just how it goes."
Gobert said he was disappoi nted with
the way things went.
"Because when Ben first got the
holeshot, he was setting a reaily good pace ,
and I thought things would settle down and
it'd be good," Gobert said . "By lap three,
the tire was just gone. I couldn't do anything
with it. It reaily annoyed me, because I need
to get some good points. It was just one of
those situations, again, where you spend the
race trying to finish, not tryi ng to win . That's
it, basicaily. All the things that went on there
with that red flag, and other stuff, it was
okay; I just tried to fight it out for the end."
Championsonline.com's Michael Barnes
was a furious fifth, wondering why he started badly three times. Still, he had the honor
of be ing first privateer.
Valvoline EMGO Suzuki's Rapp recovered fro m his eariy crash to take sixth . Then
came GP Tech's Ty Ho ward, in front of
Rapp's teammate C hris Peris, who held off
Empire Racing's Lee Acre e .
MI D-OHIO SPORTS
WlNGTON, O HIO
R ESULTS: J ULY
CAR
Former
2S0cc GP
Champion
Chuck
Sorensen
re tu rned to
the AMAtrail
for the first
time in 2004.
With the demise of the 250cc GP class,
Soren sen was left without a place to race .
Instead of taking the route of many other
250cc riders in a move to the Supersport
class, Sorensen went straight to Superbike
on a Team Stargel Ya
maha R-I . Though he 's
done a few club races and will compete in
the finalthree AMArounds, it's most ly to
get ready for a full-on assault in 2005 . "We
plan to be riding Superb ike next year,"
Sorensen said. As for this year, he tested at
jenn ings in Florida - "It still had the lights on
it," he said - and then raced in the F-USA
round at Virginia Internatio nal Raceway.
The following weekend, they were at Road
Atlanta for a WERA meeting. '" just need
more seat time ," he said. "I'm getting used
to this big th ing, just muscling it around, just
trying to get to the point where there's
some feel in the front end ." A new set of
O hlins forks was a "huge improvement."
The R-I demands a different kind of riding
than his nimb le TZ-250. "I haven't seen
what's going to work and what 's not, " he
said. Corner speed wasn't a problem, but
he needed to work on his exits. "That's
where I'm gelling worked." Rocky Stargel,
the Atlantan who sponsored his 2S0cc
effort , is backing this team, though
Sorensen said they 'd like to find a sponsor
for 2005.
C OUIlSl!
25, 2004
(ROUND S
13- 14)
SUPERSPORT FIN)U, I. RogorLee Hayden (Kaw); 2.
Ben Sp;es (Sult. 3. Aaron Gobert (Yam); 4. Tommy Hayden
(!