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World Superbike 2006 -
Round Six - Misano Superbike Race 1 June 25th, 2006 - By, Trevor Hedge |
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World Superbike 2006 -
Round Six - Misano Superbike Race 1 June 25th, 2006 - By, Trevor Hedge |
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| Troy Bayliss (AUS) dominated
proceedings at a three day World Superbike test session at Brno
last week while Troy Corser (AUS) remained at home suffering a
case of the chicken pox. Bayliss, currently leading the 2006 World Superbike Championship by a healthy margin after five rounds, concluded the Pirelli tyre development tests with a quickest time of 2m00.0s on qualifying tyres and 2m00.8s on race rubber, both well under all existing Brno Superbike best lap times. "It's been a good three days", declared Bayliss. "I did some good times this morning both on qualifying and race tyres and my long run was 39 seconds quicker than last year's time so I'm feeling pretty good about things. I'm in good spirit and looking forward to racing at Misano next week." The Ten Kate Honda squad was hard at work fine tuning a new traction control system in the aim of catching the dominant Ducati and Suzuki machines. Both Ten Kate men, James Toseland (GBR) and Karl Muggeridge (AUS), tried the system and were encouraged by the early results but know that much is still to be done. Kawasaki continued their progress towards the front with Chris Walker (GBR) ending the test with the second quickest time ahead of Muggeridge and the Yamaha pairing of Andrew Pitt (AUS) and Noriyuki Haga (JPN). Josh Brookes (AUS) and Team Kawasaki Bertocchi enjoyed a one day test at Mugello recently to help familiarise himself with his new mount. “It feels like we did 6 months of testing in one day!” commented Brookes this week. “We had a chance to go through everything from swing-arm position to various different suspension settings. It was great because I learnt so much about the bike in one day, and I can definitely apply this to my first practice session this weekend. My goal for the weekend is to make Superpole and then go for a top ten result. It’s not going to be easy, but I really believe the bike, the Team and I have the ability to reach this point. We’ll see after Sunday!" Early indications from practice and qualifying however were not pointing to any significant progress for Brookes. The Sydneysider could only manage the 28th quickest time in the heat at Misano and was obviously hoping for better things on race day. Fortunes for Ten Kate man James Toseland were much better in Superpole with the Brit taking his first Superpole win of the year ahead of Corser. Yamaha man Andrew Pitt out-qualified team-mate Noriyuki Haga to take third spot on the front row ahead of Steve Martin. It was Corser who scored the holeshot when the lights went out with Andrew Pitt and James Toseland in tow. Corser then ran in a little deep a few corners in to the first lap and was swamped by Pitt and Toseland then saw a gap and took both of them to go from third to first in one foul swoop. Haga and Walker then shuffled Corser back to fifth where he had Bayliss right on his tail. Out front James Toseland was eager to try and break away early but tyre wear was going to be a major factor in the very hot conditions over the 25 lap duration. Haga then took second place from Andrew Pitt and the Australian was then shuffled down to fourth by Chris Walker. Bayliss got the better of Corser and quickly closed and passed Andrew Pitt before latching on to the tail of Walker and Haga. Meanwhile Toseland had a lead of just over a second on his pursuers as they started lap five. Bayliss got Walker and then had Haga's very sideways Yamaha R1 to try and get past and Nitro Nori was not making things easy for the championship leader. Corser picked up his pace as the laps progressed and was right on the back of Bayliss and Haga on lap seven. Bayliss then finally managed to slip past Haga and Corser quickly followed suit to relegate the Yamaha man to fourth place. The Aussie duo then quickly pulled away from Haga and started to close on race leader James Toseland. Bayliss was all over the back of Toseland as they stared lap 11. The Briton was riding the Fireblade very aggressively and looking to be working a lot harder than Bayliss for his laptimes. Bayliss sneaked his way past on lap 12 and immediately started to pull away. Toseland was putting on a brilliant display of riding however with his Fireblade stepping sideways under power and then rearing onto one wheel while Bayliss looked to be doing it relatively easy. The lack of effective traction control on the Honda likely to be the culprit and Corser was threatening to push the Brit further back to third place. That trio however had really pulled away from Kagayama who had moved up to fourth place after getting the better of Chris Walker. Another mover was Alex Barros who had worked his way forward to sixth place while Andrew Pitt had drifted a long way back through the field after either making a mistake or experiencing machinery problems. Corser was looking certain for a spot on the podium but that wasn't going to be after he lost the front and cart-wheeled off into the kitty litter. A very costly mistake that will put another major dent in his championship aspirations and give Bayliss a massive lead in the championship if the Ducati man could bring home the win. And with seven laps to go there certainly looked as though there was no doubt about that. Corser's crash had taken the pressure off Toseland who now looked very safe in second place as the battle for third between Kagayama, Barros and Walker was being waged a reasonable distance behind the Ten Kate man. With five laps to run Kagayama managed to break away from Barros and Haga and was meting out some serious torture to his rear Pirelli in the closing laps. As they started the final lap Bayliss had 8 seconds on Toseland and Kagayama was a similar distance further behind Toseland in third. The major battle on the final lap was between Barros and Haga over the 13 points for fourth place. Regis Laconi came on strong late in the race to come home not far behind Barros and Haga to take sixth place. Toseland's second place promoted him to equal second in the championship on 149 points apiece with Troy Corser. Bayliss' win extended his championship lead out to 101 points at the halfway point of the season.
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