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For the final two laps there was little comfort in his lead, but enough, and he won his third race in a row, and fifth of the season, this time by .176 of a second. The win was Hacking's first ever at Mid- Ohio, a testament to how consistently well the Yamaha YZF-R1 LE is working. "Our bike's working really well right now, and it's allowing me to ride 100 per- cent without making any mistakes," Hacking said. "Until we get to a point where I don't feel comfortable with the bike, I don't see any point to back down. We need all the points we can possibly get right now. My team's just doing an awe- some job getting this bike set up. We've obviously had this bike for three years now, and my crew is just doing a super great job. We've got it dialed in, and that's what it takes. I don't know what else to say. Right now we're definitely on top of our game, and it feels good." Hacking put part of his success to the repaving of Mid-Ohio. He said with the concrete patches of the former surface, it played to the strength of rival Yates. "He's real smooth with the throttle midcorner," Hacking said. "It really played into his advantage with the concrete patches and stuff. Now we don't have that." "He kind of fouled it up a little bit there, getting a little over anxious on the throttle, and it definitely allowed him to get that drive on me," Bostrom admitted about the lap he was passed on. "But obviously he's doing a great job, and I think he definitely deserved the win. It's nice to be up there racing with him." Bostrom added that the Superstock R-1's "are a real handful around this track. You don't have some of the nice parts on the bike to control the power, so what you end up with is a pretty exciting race where you come out of the saddle a lot. I know I got a little excited a few times and came out of the saddle." Yates had a plan to pass Bostrom on the final lap. The move came halfway into the lap, but he couldn't execute it cleanly and backed off, rather than risk taking out himself and Bostrom. "Coming up to it - the hill in the back a few turns after the esses - I was thinking I could try it, if I could get there early enough, if I could hold enough speed through there to get up beside him. I was- n't able to do it. I just thought I'd take a look at it." Yates admitted that retaining the num- ber-one plate is getting more difficult. "Jamie's just been really strong this year, his bike's working good," he said. "I hate to see that championship gap dwin- dling away. But I'm doing my best." With three races to run, Hacking leads Yates by 27 points, 282 to 255. Jason DiSalvo, sixth today, is third with 222. MID-OHIO SPORTS CAR COURSE LEXINGTON, OHIO RESULTS: AUGUST 5, 2006 (ROUND 7) REPSOL LUBRICANTS SUPERSTOCK: 1. Jamie Hacking (Yam); 2. Eric Bostrom (Yam); 3. Aaron Yates (Suz); 4. Geoff May (Suz); 5. Jake Holden (Suz); 6. Jason DiSalvo (Yam); 7. Aaron Gobert (Hon); 8. Josh Hayes (Hon); 9. Marty Craggill (Suz); 10. Chris Ulrich (Suz); 11. John Haner (Suz); 12. Cory West (Suz); 13. Ben Attard (Kaw); 14. Roberto Pietri (Suz); 15. Akira Tamitsuji (Suz); 16. Fernando Amantini (Kaw); 17. Marco Martinez (Suz); 18. Brad Henry (Suz); 19. James Kerker (Hon); 20. Eric Erling Haugo (Suz); 21. Carlos Macias (Kaw); 22. Damon Buckmaster (Kaw); 23. Michael Sanchez (Suz); 24. David Loikits (Suz); 25. Matt Lynn (Suz). Time: 23 min. 08.41 sec. Distance: 16 laps, 38.4 miles Average Speed: 99.567 mph Margin of Victory: 0.176 sec. REPSOL LUBRICANTS SUPERSTOCK CHAMPI- ONSHIP POINTS STANDINGS (After 7 of 10 rounds): 1. Jamie Hacking (282/5 wins); 2. Aaron Yates (255/2); 3. Jason DiSalvo (222/1); 4. Geoff May (217); 5. Josh Hayes (192); 6. Eric Bostrom (168); 7. Jake Holden (159); 8. (TIE) Marty Craggill/Aaron Gobert (151); 10. Steve Rapp (149); 11. Chris Ulrich (147); 12. Matt Lynn (136); 13. Ben Attard (135); 14. Jason Pridmore (134); 15. Damon Buckmaster (129). UPCOMING ROUNDS: Round 9 - Alton, Virginia, August 19 Round 10 - Braselton, Georgia, September 2 C Y C L E N E W S • AUGUST 16, 2006 27 MY OWN RACE 99 Geoff May 4th Place Team M4 EMGO Suzuki's Geoff May ran with the lead quartet until a bobble just before the halfway point set him back. Cresting the hill in the back of the course, May said he was "getting cocky" because of how well he was entering the section and was "carrying more speed in and making ground there. And I got chatter in the rear, so I went to the gas, because that will usually get rid of the chatter - get back on the gas. I was carrying a lot of corner speed - the thing spun up, so I gave it more gas, got it spun up. It let go cresting the top of the hill - almost had a big highside - saved it." Yamaha's Jason DiSalvo got by, but May passed him back on the front straight when he saw DiSalvo signaling to his mechanics. "Tried to bridge the gap between me and the other guys again. And using my tires trying to do that. So at that point there was nothing more I could do. I was trying to maintain the pace I was doing. And ride a smart race without throwing it down the road." 59 Jake Holden 5th Place The top-placing Jordan Suzuki belonged to Jake Holden. Holden ran at the rear of the lead pack of six until the top three got away. Then he was chasing Yamaha's Jason DiSalvo and the Team M4 EMGO Suzuki Geoff May. He passed DiSalvo on the 13th lap, but by then, his tires were starting to wear. "I made a couple of mistakes trying to get around them which cost me some time," he said. "And I saw Geoff May ahead and I wanted to get him. I knew I could get by DiSalvo, but not enough time to catch May." 40 Jason DiSalvo 6th Place "Our front tire went off about five laps into the restart," DiSalvo said. "Which, I know I kind of got the short end of the stick on the restart, but I don't think it really mattered because that tire was going off either way. It was a matter of a couple of corners. One corner it was good, the next corner it felt like the thing imploded. We kind of knew it going in; we had the tire on this morn- ing and we weren't really happy with the life we got out of it. We did about 12 laps and it looked the same. It just looked really bad after the race." DiSalvo said it wasn't a set-up problem that contributed to tire wear, it was that the team made a bad tire choice. "It's funny how you can go through and you can make 15 or 20 decisions all throughout the weekend and then the one decision you make two hours before the race screws you. It's just a matter of bad luck/judg- ment, I guess." 96 Aaron Gobert 7th Place The first attempt to run the race was red- flagged on the first lap when Erion Honda's Aaron Gobert crashed on the inside of the uphill/downhill turn-seven sequence. Gobert ran off at the end of the front straight, and through the gravel, but couldn't get it stopped in time. He laid the bike down, but he bounced into the cor- ner. "I went through the gravel to slow down, but then when I got out of the gravel I was back on the grass, I was still going 100 mph," he said. "So I threw it down, so I still rolled onto the track." In the second race he raced with teammate Josh Hayes, beating him for seventh place. "It's good to be on the same bikes, doing the same lap times and we obviously just need to get things worked out just a bit better. I think tracks that suit the Hondas better, we can definite- ly run at the front with these guys. Another consistent half a second and a little bit more and we'll be there." Eric Bostom (32) leads Aaron Yates (1) and the rest of the field into turn one.