AMA - 2006

After a quick lap of the paddock this afternoon at Daytona it seems that the outcome of the Daytona 200 is a foregone conclusion. At least one outcome: the Buell XBRR will be protested after the Daytona 200 ends.

A bike that has undergone a great deal of press focus in some circles because of its presumed illegal equipment, the Buell seems lap-fast: Jeremy McWilliams qualified his Buell eighth at 1:42.536, about a second and a half off DuHamel's pole time. How many of those semi-fast laps the Buell can string together is the subject of much speculation.

Motorcycles can't be protested until after the race.

Team Yoshimura Suzuki’s Ben Spies raced his GSX-R1000 to a second consecutive AMA Superbike Championship double-header victory at the second Fontana race in California.

The 23-year-old Texan took the lead from the start from team mate Mat Mladin, lost it, then moved to the front again to win by 4.4 seconds over the six-time champion. Aaron Yates, who finished third in the Superstock race earlier in the day, finished eighth overall.

“I really have to thank the Yoshimura Suzuki crew for giving me another Suzuki GSX-R1000 to win on,” said Spies from the podium. “I don’t know if the rest of the races will be quite this easy but we’ve got to keep on it because Mat is a six-time champion and he’s going to come back even harder. So we’ll go home, do some homework and see what we can come up with for Infineon.”

Spies started the afternoon’s 28-lap race from pole position and took the lead immediately. He led for several laps before being overtaken by Mladin. With about 10 laps to go, however, Spies passed his team mate back and rode on to victory.

“Fontana has always been a good track for me,” explained Spies. “We caught a break yesterday, with Mat having some problems, but I had to work for it today. I just tried to set a good pace and then the gap started growing and I just tried to stretch it out.”

Like Spies, Mladin’s start was strong and he led for a number of laps before settling into second place. “With about 10 laps to go, I was wishing I was at the beach,” joked Mladin. “We just didn’t have it today, that’s it. This is the fifth race into the championship and we had to shut it down today to bring it home. It’s good to have somebody here to help me pick up my game and I’m looking forward to the next race.”

Yates was feeling some after-effects from the shoulder he injured at Fontana during testing back in February. “This track is a little rough on my shoulder,” he said about finishing eighth. “And we’ve been having some set-up issues with the bike as well.”

Suzuki's Mat Mladin spoke about the Sunday Fontana Superbike race that saw him fight for the win early in the 28-lap race, only to see his teammate Ben Spies take victory: "We didn't have it today, that's was it.

Mladin led Spies past the halfway point, but the Texan soon passed Mladin at the start finish line.

"We felt pretty good until lap 15 or 16. Right around that area, to stay in the 1:24s became harder and harder work," said Mat. "Obviously, it was the fifth race in the championship. I tried to give away points at Barber and got lucky. I didn't want to do it again, so we had to shut it down and bring it home. We had nothing for him."

Has the Spies Uprising caught Mladin by surprise? "Like I said yesterday, it's one of those things. I'm not that used to having someone challenge at every race. Over the years, when you win some races and some championships -- I'm not going to say easy, but we've certainly had our way for a long time -- you get a little rusty around the edges. It's good to have someone there to help me pick up my game and make me a better rider as well. I'm looking forward to the challenge and the next race."

When asked if he would be disappointed not to win at Infineon later this month, Mladin responded: "I give everything I've got when I go racing. At the moment, that's not enough. I can only control what I do. At the moment, Ben's doing a better job than us. We need to pick up our game. That's it. If you don't, there's no point in being disappointed. You have to go to the next one and see if you can get it done there," said the six-time series champion. "We have some homework to do."

Yoshimura Suzuki’s Ben Spies tied an AMA record with his sixth Superbike win in a row, today’s win coming on a cloudy afternoon at Infineon Raceway in Sonoma, California.

As he had in winning his fifth in a row on Saturday, Spies got the jump on the field and eased away. The gap grew slowly, but consistently, and at the end it was 5.290 secs.

"What do you say from that?" Spies said. "If you would have told me that would have happened at the beginning of the year I wouldn't believe it."

The streak of three double victories in a row, at Barber Motorsports Park, California Speedway, and here, matches the six wins in a row run by American Honda’s Miguel Duhamel in 1995.

As Duhamel pointed out on Saturday, his six wins came in individual races from Mid-Ohio to Sonoma, with wins in Supersport at all six, plus two more for an eight-race Supersport streak.

Unlike Spies’ previous wins, where the lead went back and forth, this weekend’s pair of victories came with Spies jetting away at the start and running flag to flag.

Second place went to Yoshimura Suzuki’s Mat Mladin, who stayed in front of the fight over third, waged early on between Kawasaki’s Tommy Hayden, and American Honda’s Miguel Duhamel

"I tried to make it as close as possible, but Ben was a bit too quick today," Mladin said.

Duhamel moved by Hayden and into the final podium spot on the 13th of 28 laps.

"It was tough man, it was a hard race," Duhamel said.

Hayden was never able to put a glove on Duhamel and came under pressure from, first, Ducati Austin’s Neil Hodgson, who took him on the 21st lap, then Yoshimura Suzuki’s Aaron Yates, who moved to fifth on the 22nd lap.

Yates went after Hodgson straight away, but traffic was thick and passing was difficult and Hodgson held fourth.

Yates took fifth, comfortably in front of Hayden.

In seventh came Parts Unlimited Ducati’s Ben Bostrom, who made a too late run on Hayden.

American Honda’s Jake Zemke was eighth for the second day in a row.

Jordan Suzuki’s Steve Rapp got the better of teammate Jake Holden late in the race for ninth, with Holden tenth.

Hodgson en B Bozz kunnen dus opzoek naar een andere werkgever..

Mag toch ook wel even onder de aandacht worden gebracht, Ben Spies heeft tot dusver 10 races gewonnen in de AMA Superbikeklasse.
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Mat Mladin's record (2005) van 11 overwinningen in een seizoen kan komend weekend op de Virginia International Raceway met 2 voor de boeg geëvenaard en gebroken worden.