Cycle News - Archive Issues - 2000's

able to go the same speed on both. lt gives us options which is nice to have and so we'll show up at Daytona with both swingarms and see which one work best and which one's most comfortable and which one is best over 15 laps." Teammate lYiguel Duhamel agreed that the racetrack would dictate which swingarm was used. "Right now they're really close," he said, adding, ''Personally I'm probably leaning more toward the kit arm." Duhamel put in over 250 miles each day between the Formula Xtrerne CBR600RR and the Superbike CBRl00RR. Of the Superbike, he said, ''We lowered the bike, we iaised the bike, we chanSed suspension, we changed swingarms. We just tried a lot of stuff. That's what testinS's all about. Some times you hit a home run, sometimes you take a swing and a miss. For me, it was really hard on me. I did over 400km each day. We got a lot done. "The 2006 bike is way befter, the 1000. everything works so good. I just want to make sure I'm healthy for Daytona, for the rest of the season. The team's great and right out of the box the bike's fast- We've been trying to improve. Sometimes we did it, some- times we didn't." Roger Lee Hayden said much the same about the Kav/asaki ZX- lORR that he rode to the fourth fastest Superbike time. The team continues to develop the Superbike and doesn't expect ever),thing to be in place untilJune. ''To be honest, we've still got a long ways to go iust got to get more comfort- able,'' he said, "There're so many things we need to get sorted out, lt was proba- bly our most productive test for me. l'm kind of bummed, but at the same time I know that we got through a lot- I almost wish we had a third day for some things we learned kind of late. But that's the way i! goes. We have another test [at Laguna Secal before we race. All in all, we're making progress and I'm Setting more comfonable on the bike and I'm able to ride it a liftle harder, so I'm pret- ty excited about that. " ln Fontana, he and brother lbmmy tested a new generation Ohlins rear shock. "We're getting it better, but it wasn't a lot betteryet," Roger Lee said. "So hope- fully, we will keep playing with it and make it better than the other one. That's the plan. We worked with a lot of maP- ping too. Got it a little better. [Kawasaki test rider Akira] Yanagawa tested a lot of that stuff for us.'' Roger Lee also had the fastest Superspoft time by about -8 of a second. "The 600 went really good, way faster than I went last year, so I was really happy about that - being really comfort- able on that bike," he said. Roger Lee's test best was a I :27. 108; in the race he ran a I:27.706. The fastest race lap was Jamie Hacking's I:27.180. Tommy Hayden echoed Roger Lee's comments. "We're slowly kind of elimi- nating options and things like that and, I mean, that's part of testing," he said. "lt seems like it goes kind of slow. I definitely think we're making progress and moving forward. We still got a ways to 8o yet. We haven't run into any walls yet. We're gefting closer eveD/ week. we're probably pretty close to the middle here looking at the times. That's better than we have b€en." Tommy Hayden said that he didn't know how far along the bike was because he doesn't know what 100 Percent is. "We could be 90 percent for all I know." he said. "We have a lot more stufl, a lot more options to come. We'll see. ldon't think it'll be complete for sure by DaItona. I know a lot of stufl that we have ordered won't be here until after Daytona." The new shock will get more aften- tion at a test at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca next week. "lt's half the size and ,ust a whole dif- ferent theory of how it works - the coils and eveo/thing - iust a whole different idea," he said. Yamaha's DiSalvo interrupted the Superbike riders bI clockinS the fifth fastest time on his Graves llotorsPorts Yamaha Rl on Wednesday. He spent Tuesday on the Formula Xtreme R6. The flnal times weren't indicative of the work Disalvo put into the test. And he had a low-speed spill. "More than anything, it was iust a hard day," he said. "l don't even think I did that many laps. lt was iust that bike's pretty phfsically demanding to ride." Disalvo said the team "did our kind of chasing our tail thing again with it and ended up with about the same time we had the last test. We're just still working to find a base setting on that thing and we're getting closer. We're narrowing things down and kind ofgoing in the right direction for this track, but I think we're kind of Soing to end up with twa base seftings. lnstead of just one that you can bring everywhere, we're Eoing to have a couple of different choices. Which isn't a bad thing for the year." Disalvo's best Superstock lap was a l:25.583, which was nearly half a second faster than the fastest race lap from 2005. DiSalvo also earned the 2005 pole with a l:24-688 on a qualifier. with his first Daytona 200 coming up, DiSalvo was concentrating on the R6. "Right now that! my main priority," he said. The main priority for Yoshimura Suzuki's Ben Spies was his Suzuki GSX- R500 Supersport bike. Spies said this was the first test with Showa's race suspen- sion that he alone is developing on the smaller bike. "Hopefully we've got a couple of tenths in the bike and once I get the bike set up lcan ride it harder," he said after a best lap of I 127.933. "we got down in the 27s, whlch is good. lt needs to get befter and it will. lt's something that's working okay, but it's about 60 percent of 100 percent. I iust got to keep goin8." Cil CALIFORNIA SPEEDWAY FoMANA, CAuroRNra FrlnuAPY 7-B 2o06 SUPCRAI(E TlHlSr L Mat Mladin (Suz!ki) l:2t.,1,1€i 2. BEn B6trcm (Ducati) l:2!.981i 3. Jake Zemke (Honda) lr25.ll8i 4. Roter L.e HaydEn (Kawasaki) l:25.417i 5. l'lieuel Duh.mel (Hond.) l:25.61,{i 6. Tommy Hiyden (Kawki) l:25.618:6. Neil Hodsson (D@ti) t:25.766:7- )6on Pridmore 6u2oki) l:26.151r L AkIE YanasaM (Krwki) l:27.14r. SUPERSTOCK: I J&. Dis:rvo (Ymha) l:25.581; 2. Airon Y s (sEUk, l:26.161: l. ldn'e H!

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