Cycle News - Archive Issues - 2000's

Briefly... Jake Holden had a big crash in the kink in the middle of the front straightaway in the Superstock final when he rear-ended Jason Pridmore. Holden went off the track at over 160 mph in a frightful incident. Fortunately, Holden's injuries were less severe than was originally feared. He suffered a broken thumb, a broken foot, and a concussion. Former AMA Superstock Champion Josh Hayes has inked a two-year deal to return to the Erion Honda team. The current Attack Kawasaki rider will compete in Formula Xtreme on a CBR600RR and in Supemock on a CBRIOOORR. "Looks like FX and Superstock, and for sure it's a bummer to be out of Superbike, but hopefully I can be implemented into that program somewhere in the future," Hayes said. "There just weren't any seats for me to go anywhere or do anything else as far as Superbike goes. I feel like it's a good opportunity to get back under the Honda umbrella. There's a lot of good people over there that I like working with, and I'm looking forward to it." As expected, Yoshimura Suzuki's Aaron Yates has re-signed with the team, the Georgian re-upping for a year with Suzuki to My 11 contest the Superbike and Superstock classes in 2006. "I've signed an agreement in principle," Yates said on Sunday afternoon. "Superbike and Supemock is the agreement that I've signed. I'm really happy here and I've been here so long. The GSX-Rs are such good bikes, and I've got a good crew - all my guys are good. I'm happy with the way things have gone, and I look forward to next year." Yoshimura Suzuki's Mat Mladin stretched his championship advantage to 10 points over his young teammate Ben Spies with his ninth pole of the season at Virginia International Raceway. His fast lap was not just fast, but very fast, the Australian smashing the lap record and ending the session with almost a second in hand over Spies and much more than that on the rest of the field. In keeping his perfect-pole-position streak intact, Mladin became the first (and only) man to lap in the I:23s on the 2.2S-mile VIR course. Mladin's best came with roughly six or so minutes left in the session, and it was decisivety better than the laps turned in by his rivals. Mladin's lap was a 1:23.9B6, with Spies turning in a I:24.7B3. "The session went pretty well," Mladin said. "We tried a couple of different race tires in this session and certainly found OWN RACE Ben Spies DNF Yoshimura Suzuki's Ben Spies didn't make it to the end of the Supersport race. Spies was sitting behind sixth-placed Chris Peris and watching Aaron Gobert creep up. "I didn't want to let him catch me, and I was going to wait until the last lap to pass Chris," Spies said. "Then I saw Chris start to lose the front end, and then I started to lose the front end. Then he did lose the front end, and I think I lost the front end in the exact same place. I don't know if we were on a sealer line or what." 6 Damon Buckmaster 5th The Supersport race was similar to Superstock for Yamaha's Damon Buckmastel; only easier. The carpal tunnel syndrome (which, he revealed earlier in the day, had bothered him for more than a year) reared up later on the smaller bike. "When I downshift, my fingers would get lazy just to release the clutch, and I'd end up dumping the clutch and lock up the back," Buckmaster said. "Just silly things. I passed everybody, nobody passed me. It was a good race for us. We were running respectable times." 1S2 Robert Jensen DNF Kneedraggers.com's Robert Jensen was either gaining on Yamaha's Jason DiSalvo or DiSalvo was coming back to him. Jensen was trying to be patient when it all went wrong on the 10th lap. "I just went into tum seven, just lost the front end," Jensen said. "I did the same thing yesterday in the X [Formula Xtreme] race. I was able to save it. Today, not. There's a little bit of bumps on the inside there. I don't know if I hit those, or [if it was] just rider error. At least the bike didn't get messed up too bad." 12 Ben Attard 4th Attack Kawasaki's Ben Attard started well but then went into turn one too tentatively. Then frustration set in and he had a race full of headaches ahead of him. "Starting passing people, was making some ground up on DiSalvo and it looked like I was going to get him, and then a lapped rider held me up from turn three to turn 10. It's all pretty much like one line. So I lost probably two seconds to DiSalvo, and with two laps to go, I couldn't do it. It's unfortunate, but I've got to work on my riding and get more aggressive." the one we like. I have to admit that all three [tire choices] are very good. One offers a little better grip for me in a couple of areas. We found the one we like, and we're ready to go this afternoon. It was a 30-minute session, and we've had two hours [of practice] for the whole weekend, so it's not a lot of time to be throwing softer tires in. For me, it's a total waste of time on a day like today. We continue to go with setup, and with fIVe minutes to go on the clock, we actually changed the gearing and made a bit of improvement again there. More based toward the race, the gearing change, probably not the best for qualifying - more based toward the race. We done a couple of different things, and things are pretty good. The bike is comfortable and the lap times are pretty good." Ben Spies was as happy as he could be, considering that the man he was chasing in the championship seemed to have things totally in control. "I felt pretty good," Spies said. "It seems like every time I go out, we're taking a couple of tenths out, a couple of tenths out, but it's definitely not enough to do a 23.9 that's for sure. We're going in the right direction, and I'm happy at least. We're not sitting on top like I want to be, but that's just how it goes. We'll just go in the race and ride as hard as we can. I think we have a pretty good setup, so we'll just see what happens." The best of the rest in qualifying was Yoshimura Suzuki's Aaron Yates, the Georgian lapping at I:2S.238 to give the team a one-twa-three on the front row. American Honda's Jake Zemke put his CBRIOOORR up front, the only non-Suzuki on the front row. Zemke lapped at I:2S.335. The second row for the two races was made up of Ducati Austin's Eric Bostrom, American Honda's Miguel Duhamel, Ducati Austin's Neil Hodgson and Attack Kawasaki's Josh Hayes. "The first part of the session, going out with race tires and stuff, the bike feels really good," Yates said. "The bike is getting around a good bit better than yesterday. I know the conditions are a little cooler and it's probably helped a little bit, but we made some changes that seem to be working really well. When we tried a little softer race tire, the thing just didn't seem to have any grip. I came in and put something else on and went out and tried to go as fast as I could. I was actually going to come in after doing a 25.4 or something. The bike started moving around a bit. Eric [Bostrom] came by, and I let him by and decided to try and follow him around for a lap. I let him get out aways and tried chasing him back down. I ended up getting the 25.2, so I guess it was a good choice to stay out." Saturday dawned cooler and cloudy, with rain threatening but never making an appearance. When asked what would happen if it rained, Mladin said: "We'll make a few changes - knobby tires will be one of them," he said. "The racetrack's not too bad for rid- ing in the rain. You just go out there and do what you've got to do." Mladin likes the picturesque VIR, although, as he says, he hasn't done much winning here. But there's a reason for that. It's usually the last race of the season, and his championship is usually wrapped up. "This racetrack sets up pretty good for me," Mladin said. "I haven't done a lot of winning here, but that's because I haven't had to. There's quite a few places to make surprise passes here if you're aggressive, so if need be, then need be." Yamaha's Jason DiSalvo said it was the worst pain he'd ever experienced. It came when he struck his left leg on a trackside curbing during practice on Saturday morning. "Dude, it felt like I got hit by a truck," DiSalvo said. "The impact was huge. It's like when you clock your head on the ground and everything goes quiet for a second, that's what it was like. I thought I felt something popped. I definitely felt something tear, and I found out later it was the leathers that tore. The leathers ripped from inside the boot up to here [his knee]. It says a lot about Astars' [A1pinestars'] little Velcro here - it's some pretty strong stuff." DiSalvo was lifted off his bike and transported via ambulance to a local hospital for X-rays. Fortunately, nothing was broken. "The doctor and the physical therapist were saying that it must have gone into shock," DiSalvo said. "When I got off the bike, I saw my leg just sort of go that way. I thought I blew my knee out. The pain at the time was probably the worst I've ever felt. I came in and I couldn't stop breathing hard... as I was coming through the last corner, I was like, 'I hope I don't pass out.' I was just trying to make it there [to the pits]. It was horrible. I wouldn't wish that upon anybody." DiSalvo said he'd never noticed the curbing before in that corner. "I was actually, for the first time, where I was supposed to be," he said. "I'm always a little wide off that curb. Jeff [Haney, his trainer and coach] is over there spotting and everything and telling me to get closer to the curb. That time, that was a lap - that would have been like a 26, a good half-second quicker to that point. That was a lap and a half right there. I was still on the throttle when I got to the curb. It was a big lap. It pulled me right off the bike, pulled the whole bike sideways. It was almost a crash. It was luck that I landed back on top of the bike. From there, I just tried to get it back to the pits. I'm definitely more cautious of it [the curb] now. It hurts when I ride. When I put any pressure on it, it hurts. I hope it doesn't hurt any worse in the morning, but I don't know. If I had to go every lap like it felt the first two laps of that qualifying, I wouldn't be able to ride. I'm hoping adrenaline takes over and I can put the leg on autopilot and try to forget about it. Every left-hander, you notice it. Any time you have to put weight on the peg, you notice it." Continued on page 23 CYCLE NEWS • SEPTEMBER 7,2005 21

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