Copyright 2004, Roadracing World Publishing, Inc.

Both American Honda CBR1000RR Superbikes hit the ground Monday during tire testing at Daytona International Speedway Monday afternoon.

After completing two, 18-lap endurance runs, Miguel Duhamel lowsided at low speed in the International Horseshoe, according to Crew Chief Al Ludington.

Duhamel and his machine were relatively undamaged, but Duhamel chose to sit out the rest of the test and handed his bike over to Erion Honda’s Jake Zemke.

Moments later, at 1:12 p.m. local time, word came in that Ben Bostrom had crashed big in the chicane while in the middle of a long-distance tire test.

“I’m cutting laps, and I’m like, ‘I’ve got to keep this tire in the 1:48s and 1:49s. That way I can leave here a happy person.'” Bostrom told Roadracingworld.com. “I was in the 1:48s, then I climbed up to the low-1:49s. So I’m like, ‘How am I going to get this thing back into the 1:48s?’ Then I saw (Jason) DiSalvo. I was catching him. I thought if I could catch him in the chicane I’ll get a big draft off of him, and that’ll bring back into the 1:48s for sure.

“I ran it in there pretty big and I was kind of focused on him and not what I was doing. I knew I was going to have to trail brake the thing pretty hard because I was in there pretty deep. I started trail braking and just lost the front. Just being greedy because I wanted to catch a draft off of him, which is so stupid for testing. But I wanted to do fast laps. I wanted to stick with those lap times for 15 laps. I thought if I could get this thing back into the 1:48s after 10 laps I would be pretty happy.

“I broke real hard, started to trail it, tucked the front and the worst part is you bounce off the ground, BAM! When you’re trail braking from a straightaway you don’t have too much lean angle. When you have lean angle it’s no problem because you’re so close to the ground. But when you crash like that you fall a ways and it kind of slingshots you to the ground.”

Bostrom said he suffered a contusion to his left arm near the elbow plus assorted scrapes and bruises on his left side. At post time Bostrom was “contemplating” whether or not he would take a trip to the hospital to have his arm checked out.

Bostrom’s day, and test, ended with a best hand-timed lap time of 1:48.70, turned on a race tire during his long run.