Cycle News

IN THE WIND P24 >>SUPERBIKES BACK FOR 2015 DAYTONA 200 A MA Pro Racing announced last month that the 2015 Daytona 200 would switch back to using Superbikes – a format that was last used in 2004 when Mat Mladin won the race on the 3.56-mile track on his Yoshimura Suzuki GSX-R1000. The follow- ing year the race switched to 600cc-based motorcycles (For- mula Xtreme and now Daytona SportBike) with Miguel Duhamel earning his fifth and final 200 win on the 2.95-mile short course. Since then, every 200 has fea- tured 600s, but that will change next year. On Thursday at the Speedway a group of riders, track person- nel, team managers and Dunlop tire personnel were assembled for a press conference to dis- cuss the race going back to Su- perbikes next year. The main reason for the change from Superbikes to 600s in 2005 was straightforward: Safe- ty was being compromised. Plain and simple, the tires wouldn't last the distance between pit stops on the Superbikes. Riders were fittingly spooked and then-lead Dunlop tire technician Jim Allen had many a sleepless night just thinking about it. So what's changed to make Dunlop think that they can make tires work for what will likely be a four-pit stop race? "It is Daytona and the last thing a tire company wants to do is rest," said Mike Buckley, vice president of Motorcycle Tire Sales for Dunlop, when posed the question. "We're constantly evaluating things here. The repav- ing obviously changed the situa- tion out of the gate. That settled in a little bit, but the track continues to evolve, the bikes get quicker so we're continually looking at it. The primary thing that has changed for us is the N-Tec technology. Once we went to that technology set in the bikes that we use here, we saw the heat buildup come down dramatically. "If you think about today we're running Superbikes in the sprint format at 15 laps and we're do- ing section analysis and all the due diligence the tire compa- nies have to do at the end of the event, particular temperature readings. We're not seeing any- thing that concerns us in a 15- lap format at this point so that's a good point to start from. Now depending on what we do from a rules and regulations point of view, and how many pit stops we end up with, which would ulti- mately be about a 69-lap affair, if we end up with four pit stops than we are in a window where we are comfortable with where we are today." Dunlop also realizes that there's going to be more work to be done and the 2015 Daytona 200 won't come before more extensive tire testing at the Speedway. "That's something we're work- PHOTOGRAPHY BY LARRY LAWRENCE A press conference was held at Daytona to announce that the Daytona 200 would again feature Superbikes in 2015. continued on page 26

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