Daytona Dynasty
DAYTONA DYNASTY
RACE WATCH
Scott Russell does it again
KEVIN CAMERON
I ALWAYS FEEL LIKE AN OUTSIDER AND PARASITE FOR THE FIRST TWO or three days after I get to Daytona. Everyone has a racebike, and I don't. Then, I begin to find people to talk to, and that is a treat. Presently, I again feel 1 have some right to be here, aside from the sheer pleasure of so many idea-filled conversations with the people who practice the arts that I care about. Who among us wouldn't be delighted to talk to Rob Muzzy, Don Tilley, Dick O'Brien and Gary Mathers, all in a single day?
As Sunday and the 200 come, there is too much, though. Adrenaline sustains me through the week and the 1200-mile drive home, but there is mental filing and collating to do, and an energy debt to pay back. I flop, useless for at least two days. Then, the phone rings. Deadline closes in. Time to hit the keyboard. - -.- -.`-.~ .-
Daytona 200
FOUR-TIME DAYTONA WINNER SCOTT Russell made it an incredible five in this year’s 200-miler, riding a factory Yamaha Superbike. The widely seen televised version revealed little of the craftsmanship in Russell’s win, or in Doug Chandler’s closing second place.
The front row of the grid was Russell, Duhamel on a Honda, Chandler on a Muzzy Kawasaki and Phoenix winner Anthony Gobert on a Vance & Hines Ducati. At the flag, they all rushed away together, and it looked at first like a long day for the closely engaged Russell and Duhamel. They cleared off from a second group of Chandler, Gobert and the astoundingly fast Pascal Picotte/Harley-Davidson combination. By the fifth lap, Gobert’s Duke was falling back with mystery overheating, but Jamie Hacking on a Yamaha and Mike Hale on a Fast By Ferracci Ducati were moving up.
Russell and Duhamel exchanged the lead, but shortly Hale lost the front end entering Turn 6. Unable to challenge the leaders’ 1-minute, 50-second lap times, Gobert conserved his injured mount at a 1:54 pace. By lap 16, the leaders had a comfortable several seconds on the unbelievably improved Harley VR. Certainly Chandler and Hacking, having swapped positions with Picotte, were impressed.
“I’ll tell you what, that Harley had some legs,” said third-place-finishing rookie Hacking after the race. “It was smoking, but it kept right on runningfast. Every time a puff would come out, Doug would dive to one side. I thought, T’m goin’ with him.’”
In the next four laps, the race would turn to a shambles-and a Russell/ Chandler cruise-out, as it was last year. Luck? You know what the veterans say: “The more I practice, the luckier I get.” It would be a study in playing the odds while doing everything as close to perfectly as life allows.
Duhamel, wanting some separation before his impending pit stop, dove in so deep at the Chicane that some ob-
servers thought he’d had brake failure. Then, he crashed. As Russell would later say, “He must’ve turned his brain off for a minute.”
Already over the wall with fuel and tires, the Honda crew stared east but no one came. Russell pitted for two tires and fuel in about seven seconds. Chandler led that lap, but pitted next. Russell, having disposed of his opposition, now led to the finish. While his bike had shown some small wiggles on initial braking, it displayed “set-up toughness.” As the tires aged, the bike remained stable.
Chandler wasn’t so lucky. His first front tire wasn’t perfect, but a replacement at the first stop was better.
People watch, they root for favorites, but today’s Daytona can’t be won by an outsider. It takes a Duhamel, a Russell, a Chandler-an experienced man. A private pilot can talk on the radio and fly the aircraft. But a multi-engine commercial license-holder must do the same while transferring fuel, changing course and evaluating a weather front. Riders pass through similar stages on their way to the top. One stage is "fast." Honda's Ben Bostrom is fast; that is, he isn't bothered by speed, and he has excellent machine control so his bike doesn't get away from him. This is a solid beginning, but there are levels beyond fast. When you see a rider braking late, getting in too hot, and then running wide, you can expect to see a front tire as wasted as Bostrom's first one was. As he devel ops his skills, he will learn to go fast at much less cost to himself in energy and concentration. It takes time. Ben finished a strong fifth, but he will do better. Russell and Chandler are be yond fast. They are fast in a way that keeps them safe from backmarkers, able to use tire life strategically, able to go fast with minimum energy.
Russell rides in 500cc Grand Prix style, flicking the bike over quickly to waste minimum track, then pushing it upright as soon as possible to get max imum tire grip for the drive out. Part of this is the special nature of Miche lin tires, part is Russell's own style, which Muzzy says first appeared at this track. Chandler's movements are more careful, even viscous-he oozes back into the saddle on corner exits, rather than hopping up once the bike is near-upright. He is avoiding peak forces on his tires at all costs.
Focus on one small point: Russell stays inside on the exit of the East Horseshoe, rather than running wide like almost everyone else. A handicap? Keith Code pointed out, and binoculars confirmed, that the inside of the track is subtly but usefully banked. The out side is almost off-camber. Why slide on the outside, when you can conserve tires on the inside? Such small points, summed around a racetrack that this man knows intimately, add up to some thing better than horsepower.
Russell's Yamaha turns well, which allowed him to hold inside lines, and to pass dangerous backmen on the lower-risk inside. He does all the little things all the time, like getting his back up high every time he tucks in (aero clean-up, good for 150 extra revs or more at high speed), carefully avoiding acceleration-limiting wheel ies and sliding minimally. He was rock-steady everywhere.
The Yamaha was fast and handled well. Vance & Hines crew chief Jim Leonard, now responsible for the Ducatis of Gobert and Stevens, worked with Yamahas until this year. He said, "Yamaha has a special gear box just for this track. And we don't." This is history speaking. Yamaha has always optimized its bikes for this track, accepting whatever handicap might result elsewhere. The U.S. team can be proud of Hacking's third place-another proof that there is new power in this group. Crew chief Tom Houseworth said, "I've been in this a long time, and the other night when we got done, I was looking at the bikes. We take it for granted, but these are really trick, really powerful bikes."
Yamaha's five-valve combustion chamber may have trouble delivering the World Superbike combo of wide range acceleration and top speed, but it can go fast at Daytona. Yamaha has won more 200s than anyone else. Now imagine its new, Ri-style 750...
Russell's last words in the post-200 press briefing were down-to-earth: "Where're we eatin' tonight, Bob?" "Gene's," came the shouted reply. "Ah knew that," Russell retorted. Gene's Steakhouse is a Daytona tradition, es pecially for winners.
The Kawasaki is outstandingly hooked-up. You can see its rear sus pension working near the top of its range as Chandler accelerates off Turn 3. There is no squat, but the bike isn't topping, isn't harsh. Kindness to tires; a hooked-up tire runs cool, runs long. The sensation of the week was the Harley VR1000. Lowering its own record into the 1 :53s during the winter Dunlop test, the bike stunned every one when Pascal Picotte hammered down to a qualifying 1:49.235, only .4 off Russell's record pole time. Team Manager Steve Scheibe was oblique about this-ascribing it to lots of small gains in many areas-but there is a big difference between low-49s and mid 53s. Yes, the new Ohlins fork with its lower stiction did seem to track the ground better, giving improved steer ing under acceleration. But this team has found something it desperately needed, most likely having to do with line-holding ability.
Tragically, the same team had disas trous pitstops, with the air wrench chattering long and often. Spacer problems? Axle spinning? A bad clutch throwout bearing? All of the above? Picotte's disappointment was acute. The Kawasaki team feared he'd be hit by one of their bikes, as he leapt about pit lane in a frenzy. Final ly, the engine began to sound like it was chewing itself and swallowing the pieces. Continuing a great H-D tradi tion ("Magneto trouble!"), it was as cribed to electrical problems.
The pace of change in racing is slow-it has to be. Rob Muzzy says his team has used the same basic chassis setup since 1995, and has only recently been able to improve on the power of the older, longer-stroke engine. Every one fears a new bike, because it means starting all over again, searching for a working setup, making friends with the limitations of a new engine. All the same, the Honda RC45 has earned few friends despite its power and the devel opment lavished upon it by its maker. "The Evil 45," said one critic. "You can either get it to turn, or you can get it to hook up. Not both."
Honda engineers are too fond of trying to prove they can win races with unusual motorbikes, in effect, swinging two bats. That probably won't change. CBR75ORR, anyone?
Mat Miadin pushed his rear-wheelhopping, chain-chattering Suzuki GSX-R750 into fourth place, the re ward for his persistence and hard, hang-way-off riding. These bikes have plenty of power and good acceleration. If they could make a discovery like Harley has, no one would see which way they went. But power isn't enough. Calm, unex citable Aaron Yates missed Wednesday practice because of a broken jaw, the product of Daytona's night culture. It didn't stop him from riding in both 600cc Supersport and Superbike races. He crashed out of the 600 race and fin ished sixth in the 200. He's a hard case.
The highest-finishing Ducati was the Ferracci bike of ex-Yamaha man Tom Kipp, in seventh. His reaction to his new mount? "It has a ton of torque." In eighth and ninth were the two V&H Dukes of Gobert and Thomas Stevens. Gobert's overheating problem is curi ous because cooling was an issue with the early 851 s, and was then thorough ly dealt with. Gobert, assuming that timing was from the start/finish line, had rolled off on his best qualifying lap early, thereby possibly missing pole position. He and his bike were impres sively fast. Ducatis have had a reputa tion for being short-fused, leading to some Daytona de-tuning in the past. The stronger, 1997-spec engine with its thicker cylinder liners has yet to show what it can do in the Florida sun.
Fuels perfumed the air. As Russell's > #4 Yamaha was warmed up, its exhaust brought tears to my eyes. Formalde hyde? Gobert's #95 Ducati smelled like the odorant in butane gas-a touch of sulfur. On the track, the Harleys and some others trailed a redolence of styrene, and some unburned fuel in the pits had a strong wintergreen smell. These are agreeable mysteries. AMA fuel test methodology is pretty basic, so maybe fuel companies with experience from the "diene days" in Formula One (circa 1991) have found a new outlet for their science. Personally, I always wanted to put bacon grease in my race fuel, in hopes of distracting opposition riders who'd missed their breakfasts.
It's considered professional to ignore Daytona speed-trap numbers, both be cause there have been questions of their accuracy, and because top speed doesn't win races. All the same, tuners secretly love the numbers because they reveal who's got the power. The Superbike radars divided into two groupsthe factory bikes, which all speedtrapped in the 170-178-mph range, and the privateer bikes, which grouped with 600 and 750 Supersport numbers in the 154-164-mph range. What this says is either that no private team actually lays out the big bucks for Superbike kit parts, or that those who do can't make their bikes go. This implies no disre spect to privateers; it's senseless to bet the price of a house (the $125,000 worth of Superbike pieces in the Yosh speed-book, for example) to try for 10th-place money. The factories, on the other hand, cheerfully lay out $300,000 bikes on a chance of earning splashy, "We Dominate Daytona" ad spots. There's still fun at the $2 window.
The Suzukis continue to be a puzzle, for they have all the obvious ingredi ents for success, in spades. Everyone has a theory-the swingarm's too long, the sprocket-to-pivot distance is too great-but my surreptitious tape-mea sure knocked out the most obvious of these theories. Every team with a good setup says roughly the same thing: The window of variability is very small, and it doesn't change much from track to track. Could it be that Harley and Picotte have found their window, and that Suzuki has not?
I asked Rob Muzzy, "If you wanted to make your bikes eat their tires so they'd be useless for the last 10 laps of every race, how would you do it?" He chuckled: "I can't say I ever con sidered that a useful goal, but I'd screw up the suspension with the swingarm-pivot height, I guess."
And people wonder why there are carbon-fiber covers over the Muzzy Kawasaki swingarm pivots.
750 Supersport
CONTROVERSY AND DISQUALIFICATION! Scandal in the family! Supersport has swaggered along the precipice for a long time, and it was only a question of whose creative Supersport R&D would be redefined as illegal modifi cation in the tech garage. I am remind ed of the old midget racer who, caught with a quarter-inch overbore, retorted, "Hell, that's just racin' clearance!"
No one likes to see a rider's hard work taken from him, but there are rules in any game. Supersport engines are supposed to be stock-period. In this case, it was the two HyperCycle Suzukis of Jason Pridmore and Nicky Hayden, finishing first and second, that were found to be outside the regula tions. The cited infraction was "illegal machining of the upper crankcase."
Of course, everyone in these classes does everything he can (with, in some cases, direct factory help) to raise com pression. This means shaved cases, decked cylinders, heads with more off the bottom and less off the top, so they measure stock thickness. It has also meant pop-up valve seats, surface-gap plugs run without plug washers and re shaped piston crowns, with perhaps con-rods a thou or two overlength. You get the idea. It's harder to get creative in the cam department, because AMA tech has a Cam Doctor to profile and compare cams in detail. This is in addi tion to the normal stuff such as trick fuel from Elf, coatings, trashing the oil pump, running watery oils and loosen ing up from stock clearances. Let's add the use of two ignition boxes-a hidden good one that does the job, and a stock dummy in the normal location.
Always remember Racing's First Law: Everyone spends all the money he has. If the rules say he can't spend it on the obvious engine mods, he spends it on non-obvious mods. Hey, are these frames stock, or are they lightweight dupes with doctored geometry? When the AMA puts a Computrack machine in tech, then we'll know. These wheels measure stock on the outside of the rim; how about the inside? The beat goes on, and we'd best save our moralistic tut tutting for Bosnia or the Chechen cri sis. Everyone wants those cookies, so someone is bound to be caught with his hand in the jar now and then. Can't eat cookies without reaching for them. Sometimes you don't have time to be subtle. Then you get caught.
The double-DQ (you can bet it will go to an appeal board) advances Richard Alexander to first in 750 Su persport, with James Randolph sec ond and Mario Duhamel third.
600 Supersport
OKAY, 750 SUPERSPORT IS A RACE among Suzukis, and so has little "sales power," but 600 is another mat ter, with Honda the reigning champi on, Suzuki the hungry opposition and Doug Chandler's new-design Kawasa ki ZX-6R the gadfly. This is a class of machine that actually sells in volume, so a 600 win is the sales departments' pearl beyond price. And so it is that Chandler, who would naturally rather concentrate on Superbike, was per suaded to set his hand to 600 racing.
Chandler won the 600 contest at Phoenix, and he was top qualifier here. On Sunday, the situation was compli cated by wind, which would help in one direction, but make gearing critical in the other. Chandler and Yates got away first, followed by Duhamel. The Honda and Suzuki seemed more capa ble into the wind, enabling them to overcome the narrower top-power ad vantage that the Kawasaki showed on the way to the Chicane.
After Duhamel had led three laps, a red flag restarted the play. By lap 3, Chandler had contrived to lead through the infield and had a clear shot at the banking and Chicane. Then he expanded into the empty space ahead. By lap 7, he had three seconds on the tight Honda knot of Duhamel and Bostrom, with Nicky Hayden (HyperCycle Suzuki) moving up fast.
` IX{ S~~iI1~ seconds over Bostrom, who had won the hectic positional war from Chicane to finish line over Duhamel. Crafty Steve Crevier (Suzuki) prevailed over Hayden to complete the top five. In the pressroom afterward, a red-faced and very worn-out-looking Bostrom asked for water, while Duhamel and Chan dler had dry hair and looked at ease. A rider works hard on the way up!
Pro Thunder
AT PHOENIX, SHAWN HIGBEE WON ON his Don Tilley Buell, with Paul Har rell second on a Triumph Triple. I was sure the Triumphs would run away and hide on speed alone at Daytona. Little did I know that Higbee's Buell was actually a home-brewed shortstroke special, able to reach a very non-Harley-esque 8000 revs, while producing a reputed 120 bhp. In the race, Higbee and Willow Springs spe cialist Curtis Adams, on a Triumph, ran off from the opposition, making a very exciting nose-to-tail contest until Higbee heard the machine-gun tst-tst tst of a blown head gasket. He led every lap but the last, finishing sec ond. Third was Michael Gage, on an other Triumph. This could be fun.
250 GP
THE BIG BREAK FINALLY CAME: RICH Oliver now rides the Yamaha Super bike, leaving 250 GP open to all those who, in former years, hungered for sight of his disappearing seat back. Neither heat winner-Mark Fos
ter nor Al Salaverria-would figure in the final result, won by Takahito Mon on a Moto Liberty Honda, with Yama-riders Roland Sands and Chuck Sorensen second and third. French pipes, Dutch pipes, reeds in pale green and black, with and without stops, holes or helper springs-rumors fly through the garage area as to who's running what, and pulling what gear. Now that all new 250s are de signed to run on European no-lead fuel, what's the best setup for higher octane American rules? Let the most adroit dyno operator win.
