American SuperBike 2001 - Round 11 - Brainerd - Race
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Round 11 of the 2001 AMA Chevy Trucks US
Superbike Championship at the Brainerd International Raceway brought with it
drama for defending two-times American Superbike champion Mat Mladin. Starting from pole position for the race, Mladin was lying in sixth place when he lost grip on the front end of his Team Yoshimura Suzuki GSX-R750 at Turn Eight and crashed out of the race. Mladin escaped injury in the incident, but his bike was too badly damaged to be able to continue. The incident changes the complexion of the championship slightly as Mladin's lead in the points table has been reduced from 46 to 20 points over Team Kawasaki's Eric Bostrom (who finished fifth today) with three rounds remaining. "I guess all that means now is that we have to go out and race for the title, rather than planning for it," said Mladin afterwards. "I don't know exactly what happened out there, but all I know is that the front end just tucked under and I went down. I was in about sixth place at the time. The bike was pretty badly damaged and there was no way I could have rejoined the race. As bad as the race may seem, at least I will leave here with a 20-point lead rather than a 20-point deficit. That's where all of the hard work early in the year has paid off." Today's race win went to American Honda's Nicky Hayden, who edged out team-mate Kurtis Roberts by 0.005 of a second at the end of 21-laps. The pair were followed by Miguel DuHamel on the third American Honda RC-51 and Mladin's Team Yoshimura Suzuki team-mate Jamie Hacking.
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