HRC Report

American Honda's Jake Zemke celebrated the Honda Summit of Speed by putting the Honda CBR1000RR atop the Superbike podium with a convincing victory on the inaugural weekend of racing at Miller Motorsports Park in Tooele, Utah.

"It's been a year and a half of hard work and the guys never stopped working and that's what paid off today," Zemke said after his third career AMA Superbike win. "Nobody's lost their drive or their motivation during the whole process. There were some long weekends last year and this year's been really good. Up until Saturday's race, there'd been a Honda on the box every race this season."

Zemke set the tone for the weekend by challenging for the win on Saturday.
The Californian was bumped out of the lead on the 15th of 21 laps, dropping from first to fourth. While fighting his way back to the front, Zemke crashed heavily into the dusty run-off on the 18th lap. Undeterred, he picked up his motorcycle and finished eighth, one spot behind teammate Miguel Duhamel. Duhamel struggled with a cold all weekend and also fought a front tire push that developed early in Saturday's race.
Sunday's race was stopped on the ninth of 21 laps when corner workers suspected oil on the track. Zemke was second at the time after his team had worked hard to replicate the Honda CBR1000RR he'd ridden to such good effect for most of Saturday's race.
On the re-start Zemke slotted into third, moving to second lap 15, then into the lead two laps later with a draft-pass into turn one. The advantage over second-placed Mat Mladin (Suz) grew quickly and topped out at 4.134 seconds after 21 laps of racing.
Behind second-placed Mladin came Saturday's winner, Ben Spies, in third.
Fourth went to a determined Duhamel. Still not 100% physically, Duhamel fought back after being passed by Tommy Hayden (Kaw) on the final lap and came within just over a second of joining teammate Zemke on the podium.

Jake Zemke 8th Saturday, 1st Sunday
Saturday: Mat got inside me going up into the little 'S' section up there-his entrance line was really tight-and I had already turned in from the outside and I was online to make the corner and we hit pretty good and it pretty much knocked me right off the track and he went all the way to the edge of the track and that let (Ben) Spies go by us both and from then on I was just trying to play catch up and we kept getting these lappers. I finally had one lap of clear track and I closed quite a bit on those guys and then I just lost the front right on the seam going in there, right where the pavement seam is there is a little bit of a dip right there and I was pushing too hard on the front. It's funny, because at the start of that lap I told myself, 'OK, don't push too hard on the front, because I knew the thing was already just a little bit greasy.' And I pushed too hard on the front. I wasn't going to settle for anything but being on the podium, I mean, realistically, we had a great shot at winning that race.

Sunday: I just tried to do what I was wanting to do yesterday which was just wait until the last five laps and really put my head down and try to make a break and today it worked. Luckily, I was able to run a couple of quick laps there and get away from Mat (Mladin) just a bit and that's all she wrote. Then I could back it down a little bit and just bring it on home. We've come a long way in a short amount of time. It's definitely worth all the hard effort that we put in to have a package like we had this whole weekend, that we can go out there and race heads-up with these guys and ride the wheels off the thing and that's what we were able to do today and that was a great race.

Miguel Duhamel 7th Saturday, 4th Sunday
Saturday: I think I've seen the worst of it today. I think I'll be better tomorrow. But yeah, just coughing and sneezing, you know the usual coughs.
I haven't had a cold in years so, you know, I guess I was due. Well, we got a really good start. And the bike's working decent and we had a little bit of uh, I suspect it is a front-brake dragging problem, and in turn three I lost the front when I was turning with those guys in the beginning there. I was hanging in there with Ben (Bostrom) and I was like, 'Okay, not too bad.' And then coming down the chicane, I lost the front there again. I mean you tuck the front just so many times and you go, 'Hey, that was a warning and you just gotta back off.'

Sunday: For the longest time I could see Mat (Mladin) and Jake (Zemke) and Ben (Spies); they were not that far off. Just that little mistake going down the chicane in the back and I lost a bit of confidence and got a little cautious and they put the gap on me and I was trying to stay there. And in the middle of the race I almost forgot what I was doing out there. My head, seriously I was going through corners, going, 'You've got to concentrate.' But anyway, I was keeping Ben (Spies) in sight and finally I said, 'Let's just go for it,' and I tried to catch Ben. In the last lap I wanted to lead deep into turn one-I didn't think anybody could pass me there-but I went extra-deep because I knew I could make some cheap time on probably Spies, and I was kind of hoping to get him towards the end, but I went wide, hit the cracks, lost the front, saved it with the knee.

Sunday Superbike:
1. Jake Zemke (Honda)
2. Mat Mladin (Suzuki)
3. Ben Spies (Suzuki)
4. Miguel Duhamel (Honda)
5. Tommy Hayden (Kawasaki)
6. Neil Hodgson (Ducati)
7. Aaron Yates (Suzuki)
8. Jason Pridmore (Suzuki)
9. Steve Rapp (Suzuki)
10. Matt Lynn (Suzuki)

Saturday Superbike:
1. Ben Spies (Suzuki)
2. Mat Mladin (Suzuki)
3. Ben Bostrom (Ducati)
4. Neil Hodgson (Ducati)
5. Tommy Hayden (Kawasaki)
6. Aaron Yates (Suzuki)
7. Miguel Duhamel (Honda)
8. Jake Zemke (Honda)
9. Jason Pridmore (Suzuki)
10. Jake Holden (Suzuki)

Championship Standings:
1. Ben Spies (388)
2. Mat Mladin (367)
3. Miguel Duhamel (302)
4. Neil Hodgson (288)
5. Aaron Yates (278)
6. Jake Zemke (273)
7. Tommy Hayden (272)
8. Ben Bostrom (244)
9. Jason Pridmore (237)
10. Steve Rapp (205)

Mat Mladin Motorsports Report

Hotbodies Racing Mat Mladin Motorsports Suzuki rider Marty Craggill battled the flue as well as his competitors at the new Tooele, Utah, Miller Motorsports Park on Sunday to come away with an impressive 10th-place finish in the facility’s first-ever AMA Repsol Superstock race.

“The start was good,” said Craggill. “The Hotbodies Racing Mat Mladin Motorsports Suzuki GSX-R1000 was running well and I was really happy with my pace for the first half of the race.”

In spite of suffering from flue symptoms, Craggill also had a good showing in Saturday afternoon’s Superstock qualifying session. Posting a fastest lap of 1:53.416, he was slated to start from the third row of the Miller grid.

“The track’s good and the GSX-R1000 is good, I’m just not so good because I’m sick and I’m running a fever,” said Craggill. “But it will be all right as long as I keep getting better. In qualifying I did my fastest time on a race tire, not the qualifying tire, so we should be OK for the race.”

In the 13-lap race, Craggill had a good launch and was riding well. He’d moved up into eighth place but then began feeling fatigued and backed off the pace. This result is Craggill’s fourth top-10 Superstock finish of the season.

“I started feeling bad again,” he said afterward. “I had a couple of front-end slides and I didn’t have the energy to save it so I slowed down. Now I’m just looking forward to taking a few weeks off and getting ready for Laguna Seca.”

Hotbodies Racing Mat Mladin Motorsports Suzuki's AMA Repsol Superstock race at Laguna Seca Raceway in Monterey, Calif., is slated for July 21 - 23, 2006.