World Superbike Championship
A small error of judgement from
FUjiwara dropped him back off the vapor
trail of Harm's Honda and closer to the
clutches of the slow starting but rapidly
advancing Foret.
One lap after Curtain went past Parkes
for the lead, Foret repeated the prescription of bitter pills for Fujiwara, also at turn
one. Harms, drawing sparks from the
undercarriage of his CBR, appeared to be
easing toward Parkes, imperceptibly
slowly, but no matter what he did, unless
Parkes had horrible bad luck, he would
not get overtaken by Harms.
Foret in fact went up the inside of
Harms at turn four, a pushy one, which
drew gasps as Harms had to modify his
line. It looked less strident in replay but
equally impressive. Harms was getting
squirrelly on the brakes at turn one and
lost enough ground on lap 20 (of the total
23) that he was caught by Fujiwara. He
then put half a second or so into the
Japanese rider almost right away, as he
sensed the danger.
Harms' determination to run with the
big boys no matter what had an almost
inevitable outcome on lap 21, as he fell in
the middle of the first section.
On the road, Foret had eased through
on Parkes, setting about Curtain, for the
sake of honor, whatever else was at stake.
By the advent of the final lap, Foret
was in a safe second on the road, third on
the aggregate rankings, but he still hustled
through to win the second race - a hardcore, top-step-of-the-podium junkie to
the last, even if it was only a virtual one.
Nothing could hide the fact that the
Yamaha boys had it sussed here, and that
is the first time all year that they've looked
quite that good, despite Parkes' wayward
talents and Curtain's ageless speed.
A bizarre day in Supersport as well, with
Charpentier, and more significantly Honda,
roundly beaten for the first time, and with
a new R6 coming next year as well.
Honda will be hoping that it was just
one of those days. After being on the
podium every round for the past two
years and failing this round to collect
some kind of 600cc silverware, Ten Kate
hopes it will be at least another two
before it fails again.
eN
EU~OSPEEDWAY
LAUSITZ, GERMANY
RESULTS: SEPTEM8E~
(ROUND
10
11,
200S
OF 12)
SUPERBIKE QUALIFYING: I. Lorento Lanzi
(1:39.019); 2. Troy Corser (1:39.092); 3. Chris Vermeulen
(1:39.275); 4. James Toseland (1;39.66S): 5. Andrew Pitt
(1,39.899); 6.1
