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/146690
~ ROAD RACE World Cham~ionshi~_rbi_ke_Se_ries_: I_in_alr_ou_nd _ ~ Texan Doug Polen finished first and second in the two New Zealand legs of the World Superbike Series and in the process earned his second World Championship. Fabrizio Pirovano barely beat Polen to win the second race at the Manfeild circuit.. • Polen's the champ, agaIn By Gary Pinehin 6 MANFEILD, NEW ZEALAND, OCT. 25 OUg Polen retained the Diesel Jeans World Championship Superbike title for a second season with yet another faultless display of D tactical riding in the final round 'at Manfeild. It was the third time in four years the championship had gone to the wire and on each of those three occasions, Manfeild in New Zealand has hosted the final showdown. Polen went into the final two races of the season with a 26-point lead over Raymond Roche and wrapped the title up after winning the first leg while Roche could only take third place. That gave Polen the championship, 354 points to 323, but the Texan didn't take it easy in the second leg. Riding his Eraldo Ferracciprepared, Team Police Ducati, he battled all race long in a 33-lap thriller with teammate Giancarlo Falappa, the Italian getting the verdict across the line by one-hundredth of a second after getting better drive out of the final turn. Of his second straight World Championship title, Polen said, "It's really great to win the championship again. It's not really any harder than last year, though we had some problems earlier in the year. I knew once we got them sorted out, I would be in a good position to win the title. I knew what I had to do and I went out and did it." Falappa had also been a contender in the first leg but pulled out with a broken gear change linkage after 22 laps. Had he finished the race in second place he would have finished third in the points. Instead he took 10urth overall, one point ahead of fellow Italian Fabrizio Pirovano, who had a lackluster final meeting with two fifth places on the BYRD Yamaha. Team Moving Kawasaki's Rob Phillis held on to third place in the final standings, the same result as last season. He finished fourth and seventh on the day in what could be his final World Championship Superbike Series ride, if Kawasaki pursues their plans to only offer the 36-year-old star a National contract for 1993. Qualifying Even though heavy overnight rain ceased, dull weather dominated qualifying at Manfeild but the rain held off and everyone ran slicks each session. Falappa annexed pole, his fourth of Jhe season (only Polen with six scored more) with a time set in Friday's first session of one minute, 06.74 seconds - almost a second inside the lap record of 1:07.95 set last year by Tasmanian Malcolm Campbell, riding a Honda RC30. Pirovano took his factory Yamaha to second fastest with a 1:06.82 on Saturday morning. He had the trick new rear shock linkage which Magee. had run on the works bike a week previous at Phillip Island. Polen qualified middle front row with a 1:07.02 in the final Saturdaysession and was confident of his title chances going into Sunday's race. "For.. sure I'd like to end the season with a win or two but it depends on what happens during the race," he said: "The championship is more important to me than winning races, but all the same, if I have a chance to go for victory, I'm gonna take it." Fred Merkel once again shone in qualifying, taking fourth place on the grid with a time three-hundredths ot a second slower than Polen. Complet-