Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

~ ROADRACE World Championshi~_rbl_'ke_S_en_'es_: R_o_uD_d_5 ~ The Spanish round of the World Superbike Championship gets underway with Doug Polen (1) getting the jump on the field. Stephane Mertens (4), Fabrizio Pirovano (5), and Carl Fogarty (7) battle for second. Phillis takes control with Spanish win By Gary Pinchin Photos by Johan Vanderckerchove JARAMA, SPAIN, JUNE 21 awasaki factory rider Rob Phillis leads the,world! The 35-year-old Australian grabbed his second win of the Diesel Jeans World Championship season when he won the first leg of the Andorran round at the Jarama circuit near Madrid in front of 19,000 sun-drenched Spaniards. Then the Team Moving-sponsored rider muffed his start in the second leg but battled through to finish second behind defending World Champiqn . Doug Polen. And Phillis now leads the championship by seven points over Polen. "My bike was really good today," K 16 said the jubiliant Phillis. "Now we gotta work out how to beat (Doug) Polen again in Austria. It'll be nice to go home leading the championship after Zeltwegl" Phillis took the lead on the third lap of the first race and was never headed - although towards the end of the 24 lap race it looked like he would be caught by Polen. But Polen's Team Police Ducati clutch failed with two laps remaining, leaving Phillis in the clear to record the third win of the year 'for Team Moving Kawasaki. But it was all Polen in the second race. He broke loose early on, set a new lap record on the lOth lap (1 minute, 36.955 seconds) and no one was going to catch the flying Texan as he cniised , to a five-second victory for his fourth win of the season. Frenchman Raymond Roche reIl\3ins third in the championship. He finished second in the first leg on his works Ducati, but could only manage sixth in race two after running off the track early on and then losing a cylinder on the final lap. Kawasaki's Aaron Slight is still fourth in the points after fifth and sixth places in Spain. He was haunted all weekend by handling problems and a sluggish motor on race day. "I wasn't happy with my races, but when I heard that (Fabrizio) Pirovano had a DNF and (Giancarlo) Falappa didn't do so good, I'm happy to keep fourth place overall," Slight said. The other Americans? Richard Arnaiz pushed his Rumi Honda RC30 to the absolute limit, but his hard riding couldn't overcome the uncompetitive V-four powerplant. He finished a plucky 12th in both races, adding eight points to the six he scored in Belgium. Two-time World Champion Fred Merkel found the going tough in his first race of the season. Still far from fit, taking pain killers and undergoing physiotherapyy on his injured ankle between races, the Californian finished 17th in the first leg on the BYRD Yamaha but was taken out in the first gear tum one hairpin by Italian Davide Tardozzi in the second race. Qualifying Polen demoralized the opposltIon throughout qualifying. From the first untimed practice, the World Champion was always fastest and finally claimed pole with a 1:36.226 lap (89.487 mph), the only rider to crack into the 36s on the 2.059-mile circuit, . and over 1.3 seconds quicker than his nearest rival, Belgian Stephane Mertens. Polen had some initial suspension problems and admitted: "Setting up for this track is a bit of a compromise. I like to get it smooth through the bumps at the top of the hill (a fast right/left combination). But we're dialed in and Tm confident for the races with the pace around high 37. The next six riders were separated by a mere 0.3-of-a-second, but it was . an all-Ducati front row. After Mertens --:-- _ recorded his best qualifying effort of the year on his Total Wanty Ducati, came privateer Carl Fogarty, who was back to running his own engine. The factory motor he had at Spa was also used at the Isle of Man TT (by Trevor Nation) and had not been rebuilt in time for Spain. Fogarty arrived in Spain with no spares and was plagued with an intermittent misfire on Friday, attributed to a vapor lock caused by a faulty fuel pump. His team members were also keeping their fingers crossed that the tired, high-mileage engine would hold out. Local rider Daniele Amatria'in was fourth quickest despite crashing late in the first session of Saturday's first practice, caught out by the bumps going into Le Mans, a second-gear left. But he bounced back, putting his circuit knowledge to good use with a 1:37.603 on the Marlboro Ducati. Fifth overall, Giancarlo Falappa, also crashed, but it was a slow speed get-off that came while trying a new wider front rim on the Team Police Ducati. After good rides in Germany and Spain, he was back struggling with his weak left shoulder on this technical13-turn race track. "It is only bad in two places, the fast parts of the track where you have to flick the bike from side to side, but it is enough to lose some small amount of time," he winced. The quickest non-Ducati in qualifying was Pirovano on the BYRD Yamaha. He reckoned he could have gone even quicker in the final timed session had it not be-en for heavy traffic thwarting his final efforts at wrestling the pole position from Polen. Pirovano's 1:37.793 came on soft Michelin race tires. Amatriain was also on Michelins whereas the other four in front were on Dunlop qualifiers. Phillis was sev.enth overall, the last rider to crack 37 seconds. The Moving Kawasaki had a reworked crank, for better drive off the turns. The team also had some new heads but didn't get a chance to dial them in. Phillis also tried some new Lockheed carbon brakes, but reverted to steel rotors in the race. "The bike I qualified on handles really good but we hit a gearbox problem, changing from second to third, in the final timed session," Phillis said. "And the engine didn't seem to be carbureting so good - it didn't feel so fast. The other bike didn't handle so good, but the carburetion was much better so I think we'll use that bike with suspension off the other bike." Roche was eighth fastest, complaining of lack of drive out of the slower corners, in particular turn one. He clocked a 1:38.112, only 0.124-of-asecond quicker than Baldassarre Monti on the Rumi Honda. Monti, as usual, was pushing the limits on the Honda, crashed twice, and was limping around the paddock after qualifying on Saturday night, praying for rain. He looked skyward and shrugged his shoulders: "The wet is my only chance." Terry Rymer completed the top 10 with an impressive debut aboard the Portuguese-owned Pepsi Ducati. The bike arrived after practice and then . Rymer missed most of the first timed session on Friday when the fairing came adr,ift on the previously un-raced machine. At the start of Saturday'S first timed session, it cut out, possibly due to a vapor lock in the fuel line, losing him another valuable 15 minutes track time. But after some radical suspension changes, Rymer clocked a 1:38.480.

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