Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/128351
Mr. Perlect Earns AMA Honor is o rme r tender Doug Henry. Upon ~ announcing the award, AMA Pro Z Racing vice president of com~ mercial development John Farris American Honda motocross racer and reigning F AMA 250cc National MX Champion Ricky Carmichael received the AHA Speed Channel Athlete of the Year award in front of over 400 guests during the 30th annual AMA Pro Racing Championship Awards Banquet at the Par is Las Vegas Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada, on November 14. The 25 -year-old Carmichael ~ even nicknamedCarmichael"Mr. ~ Perfect." ~ ... "To be up against all these ~ namesand win. I can't believe it." a. Carmichael said. "I'm ecstatic. I may never get another one of these aga so to win it again and in. be a three-time winner with Chris Carr is really special. I'm speechless." Carmichael's was the marquis award on a night in which all was given the award in recognition of his unprecedented - and almost inconcetvable ~ second perfect sea- son, in which he won 24 straight motos en route to the 2004 AMA Chevy Trucks National Championship Motocross Series title. Carmichael was also presented with a custom Rolex watch in recognition of his Athlete of the Year accolade. Other nominees included five-time AMA Superbike Champion Mat Mladin , six-time AMA Flat Track Champion Chris Carr, AMA 125cc National MX Champion James "Bubba" Stewart, newly crowned AMA Supermoto Champion Jeff Ward and AMA Supermoto Championship con- champions were recognized for the achievements over the past year. There was a host of other special awards as well . Aftermarket frame designer Jeff Cole of C&J Racing Frames received the Award of Mechanical Excellence. Dirt track racer Johnny Murphree received the Sportsman of the Year Award. Fox Racing received the Advertising Award for best ad, while Vreeke & Associates received the Advertising Award for best ad campaign. Scott Rousseau Ducati To Bridgestone Ducati is to switc h its MotoGP tea m to Bridgestone tir es next year, abandoning its long associa tio n w ith Michelin "in o rde r to see k advant ages by being different." The move will be officially anno unced o n Mond ay, end ing a slew of ru mors about t he impending mo ve. It mea ns Ducati Desmosedici riders Loris Ca piro ssi and Carl o Ch eca (re placing Troy Bayliss) will use the same tires as Suzu ki and Kawasa ki, with allthe other major factory and sat ellite teams using Michelin. Team manager Livio Suppo ex plaine d the decision , based largely o n the perf orm ance of t he Japanese tires in the ir fourth full season in the class: They w o n two races with Makoto Tamada and claimed three pole po sitions . "W hat impressed us most was the ir spe ed of development - especiall y of ho w quic kly they recove red afte r the pr o blem s at Mugello [Na kano had cras hed at close to 200 mph when his rear tire disintegrated; Tamada re tired w ith his rear chu nkingJ," Suppo said. "We have a great resp ect for Mich elin, an d a good re lat ionship wit h t he m. Th ey always gave us th e best tire s t hat were available, but they also supply all th e best factory teams and all the best ride rs. We dec ided after a lo t of discu ssio n that if w e have different tires, then that w ill give us differ ent oppo rtunities for success. And we also believe that the Bridgestone tires have already reached a high level. "There w ill be some track s that favor Michelin, wh ere in t he past we wou ld have been fighting all the ot her Michelin teams , and som e tracks that favor Bridgestones. We have already seen th at th is year," he adde d. By the end of the season , Bridgesto ne qualifying tires w ere good almost everywh ere , and the tires excelled occasionally, taking pole and winning at Rio, and espec ially at Motegi, w he n two o ut of th ree bikes on the front row and tw o out of three on the rostrum we re Bridgestone-shod. Another connection is through its main sponsor, Marlboro, who also sponsors Ferra ri KTM's Kurt Caselli suffered a broken foot wh ile competing in the Unclassified race at th e Lake Elsinore Gra nd Prix o n November 13. Th e injury will sideline th e off-road star for th e rest of the year, and that means he 'll also be forced to sit out the upcoming EnduroCross at the Orl eans Are na over the Th anksgiving Weekend . in F I, using Bridgestone tires . "Du cati is the Ferrari of motorcycles, so anyt hing that links us wit h Ferrar i is good for our image and good for ou r sponsor," Suppo said. Tama da , mea nw hile, hop es to make the opposite move next year, from Bridgestone to Michelin, not because there is anything w rong w ith the tires , but becaus e he is tired o f hearing it said tha t he only wins on special ist Bridgestone tra cks. He wa nts th e chance to prov e his talent o n eq ual tires to t he likes of Valentino Rossi and Max Biagg!. Michael Scott www.cyclenews.com The provisional calendar for the 200S British Superbike Championship has been released. The schedule is as follows: March 28 - Brands Hatch; April 10 - Thruxton; April 24 - Mallory Park; May 2 - Oulton Park ; May 15 - Knockhill; June 5 - Croft; June 26 - Mondello (Ireland) ; July 10 Snetterton; July 24 - Oulton Park; August 21 - Silverstone; August 29 - Cad well Park; September II - Brands Hatch; September 25 - Don ington Park. Schwantz School instru ctor and forme r road racer Michael Martin isn't the only successful race r in the family. Kyle Martin, Michael's nephew, recently wo n the World Superkart Cha llenge at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca and finished second in the SKUSA Supernationals in Las Vegas. When he 's not racing . Kyle Martin is the sales and marketing manager for M4 Performance Exhausts in Dallas, Texas. At Laguna Seca, Martin won the fourth annu al World Superkart Challenge, he ld in conjunction w ith the American Le Mans Ser ies car event over the w ee ke nd of O ctober IS-17 . Martin set the fastest qualifying time on Friday with a I:24. 5S4 on th e Laguna Seca trac k, with four-time 500c c World Champion Eddie Lawson second at a 1:25.2 12. Martin beat Lawson in Saturday's 12-lap pre-final (heat race) by 1.156 seconds to set the grid for Sunday. In the final, Lawson grabbed the lead at the start headi ng into tum two, but Martin passed Lawson back in turn five and proceeded to pull away - with Lawson pitting for a missing throttle return spring. Martin ended up winn ing the race by so me 50 seconds over the rest of the field. "Eve rything went really well ," said Martin , who worked with noted AMA team owner/tuner Rocky Stargel over the weekend. "It was my first time in a tw in, and it was a brand -new kart for me . We made very few handling cha nges . It just worked really well all weekend." Next yea r 's World Superkart Challenge is scheduled to run in co njunctio n w ith the combined MotoGP/ AMA Superbike event at Laguna Seca in early July. After piloting the Space Shuttl e, astronaut Duane G. " Digg e r" Carey (Lt . Col., U.SAF.-Ret.) has left NASA and will begin a motorcycle tour of the United States and eventually the world - camping along the way. He and his wife, Cheryl, are moving to Colorado Springs, Colorado, to prepare for the trip and plan to launch their travels with a break-in expedition to Alaska. Selected as an astronaut by NASA in 1996, Carey served as pilot of Space Shuttle mission STS-109 in 2002, a maintenance flight to the Hubble Space Telescop e . STS-I 09 orbited th e earth 165 times, traveling about 3.9 million miles. "Duane is an exceptional Shuttl e pilot , but years ago he was bitten by the motorcycle touring bug, and he always wanted to return to near-Eart h exploration Continued an page 13 CYCLE NEWS • NOVEMBER 24, 2004 11