From a press release issued by Stargel Aprilia:

Racing Is Not Without Drama For Team Stargel Aprilia At Mid-Ohio

Motorcycle road racing is generally regarded as being an exciting and unpredictable sport. This past weekend at Mid-Ohio, Team Stargel Aprilia would have preferred a little less tension and a little more relaxation.

The weekend began well enough. On both the Friday morning and Friday afternoon practice sessions, Team Stargel Aprilia had set the fastest lap times. While things were going well, and their Aprilia RSV250 was performing at its usual top of pack best, the team knew that they would have to up the pace further still.

During Saturday morning’s practice, rider, Chuck Sorensen, decided to practice a couple of simulated race starts to improve an area that has been a week point for the team all season. After one of these starts, the clutch began slipping badly and the team had to retire early from the session to install a new clutch.

In the afternoon’s qualifying session, Sorensen was sitting a few tenths of a second off the pole time. Traffic had played a role in qualifying with Sorensen not getting a ‘clean’ lap. On the final lap, Sorensen dug down deep and pushed hard hoping to secure the pole. Unfortunately, he lost the front end over a bump and crashed fairly hard. Luckily, Sorensen was uninjured, but his Aprilia faired much worse. The Team Stargel Aprilia crew worked late into Saturday night rebuilding the machine, but had to use the ‘B’ engine after finding that the ‘A’ motor had ingested debris.

The race itself also had many tense and unpredictable moments. Early on, fellow Aprilia rider, Colin Jensen, suffered a violent crash that forced a red flag and stop to the race. The race was restarted and Sorensen found himself mired in traffic entering turn one. After a brief battle with Simon Turner, Sorensen broke well clear, but was too far back to make a charge at eventual winner, Rich Oliver. After posting some excellent lap times, Sorensen went on to score the team’s seventh second-place finish of the season.

Team Stargel Aprilia looks forward to the next round of the 2003 AMA 250GP season on August 29-31 at Virginia International Raceway.



More, from a press release issued by American Honda:

AMA/Chevy Trucks U.S. Superbike Championship, Lexington, Mid-Ohio

Temperature: 32
Climate: Warm, humid
Crowd: 50,000

Podium Finishes for American Honda at Mid-Ohio

American Honda’s Miguel Duhamel and Ben Bostrom each ascended the podium at the Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course, while Erion Honda’s Kurtis Roberts had two sterling performances cut short in the 13th and 14th rounds of the AMA/Chevy Trucks U.S. Superbike Championship.

In Saturday’s race, run in hot, humid weather, Duhamel finished on the podium in third, one spot in front of Bostrom. The race had been red-flagged on the 19th of 26 laps, with the grid set from the order at the end of the 18th lap. As in MotoGP, AMA races aren’t scored on aggregate time, so the first Superbike race would be an eight lap sprint to the finish.

In the final eight laps, it was Roberts who turned in the most inspired ride of the day. Pressuring race leader Mat Mladin (Suzuki) the whole way, Roberts took the lead on the final lap, losing it, and taking it back-the lead changed hands five times-only to slip off a few turns from his first Superbike win. Mladin went on to win from Jason Pridmore (Suzuki) and Duhamel.

Roberts was back out front in Sunday’s race, leading as late as the 12th of 26 laps through sheer determination, because on the third lap, the transmission on his Honda RC-51 had begun to falter, forcing him to adjust his racing lines throughout the 15-turn course. The transmission stopped working completely two laps from the end, with Roberts a certain second.

His place on the podium was taken by Jason Pridmore, behind the winner Mladin, with Ben Bostrom third.

The third place vaulted Ben Bostrom into third in the Superbike championship, leapfrogging his younger brother, Eric, who was forced out of the Mid-Ohio race by the injuries suffered at the World Superbike race at Laguna Seca two weeks ago.

With two rounds-four races-remaining, Mladin leads the points from teammate Aaron Yates, with Ben Bostrom third. Kurtis Roberts is fifth, and certain to move up, with Duhamel sure to move up from sixth.

Erion Honda’s Jake Zemke made two podium appearances on Sunday, the first a win in the hypercompetitive Pro Honda Oils Supersport race. Zemke took the lead just past the halfway mark in the 16-lap race and held off the furious charge of three others, all of whom finished with 0.770 of the winners.

“It just seems like we’re always running into a little bit of bad luck,” Zemke said after his second career Supersport win, and Honda’s third of the year for the Honda CBR-600RR. “The last two weeks really made up for it.

Later Sunday afternoon, Zemke re-visited the podium after finishing second in the Formula Xtreme race on the Erion Honda CBR-954RR. Having qualified 10th, Zemke wasn’t expecting to be in the thick of the fray, but a good start, and some judicious passes, put him into the lead group by the fourth lap, with a move into second on lap nine. There was little comfort in it with the third placed rider applying the pressure until Zemke eased away in the final laps to a secure second behind race winner Ben Spies (Suzuki).

Ben Bostrom, Saturday, Fourth Place
It’s fun racing Miguel (Duhamel), But it’s more fun racing for the win and this obviously wasn’t Daytona (where Honda finished 1-2-3) today. In the first race, nothing was keeping us from the front but myself. I was just getting faster as the race was going, but I started off really slow. In the second race, I was pretty fired up and I got a great start, but I was spinning the thing all the way around the track. It tried to spit me off a few times on the first lap. I thought maybe the tire was on the warmer too long, or I was too amped up and hard on the throttle, I don’t know. I’m really looking forward to tomorrow, really looking forward to tomorrow to try and redeem ourselves.”

Ben Bostrom, Sunday, Third Place
That’s not the way I want to finish third, obviously. I would have liked to have been up there racing with Mat [Mladin] and Kurtis [Roberts] who were getting away and did a great job both days. I’ve got some time to make up and just get better at the next one. We’ll try again at the next one in Virginia. It was warm out there today. It was a marathon. My left hand was falling asleep and I was getting that weird flushed sensation in your face and you don’t realize how much water you’re actually losing out there.

Miguel Duhamel, Saturday, Third Place
You’ve got to fight for every position: It might turn out to be a podium position. Like we all said before, you never want to get a position by somebody else crashing, especially one of my teammates like Kurtis (Roberts), but I felt that (crew chief) Al (Ludington) gave me a better bike for the restart. We talked about it, we looked at the data. I was all over Ben (Bostrom) trying to get by. We’re a team, but we’re racing for position. I felt I had a strong enough bike to be on the podium and it just happened the way it happened, unfortunately. But I’m pretty pumped about tomorrow, for sure.”

Miguel Duhamel, Sunday, DNF
I don’t know what happened there. I got on the throttle. The bike was working good. It’s not like it’s the first left hander, it’s the third left hander I believe. The tire had heat in it and it was gripping great. (Crew chief) Al (Luddington) said he thinks I hit the seam. The thing was hooking up. I was on the throttle and that thing just snapped sideways completely and I just got thrown off the bike. I think it’s kind of BS that that happens on a racetrack. Why do we have seams on the racetracks? Why do we have cement patches everywhere? Shouldn’t it just be one surface. It’s not Supermotard. I got to believe if it’s one surface I would have been fine.

Kurtis Roberts, Saturday, Seventh Place
The race was good. Mat (Mladin) and I just pulled away. Mat is so strong – always. I had a little bit left, but I was saving it for the end. Then we got the red flag. After the red flag, the transmission was just… every lap I was missing a gear, except for the lap I drafted him – I don’t know how I got it to go through. Even in the Thunder Valley over here it did
it three or four times. It did on the last lap and he got me and I got him back on the brakes. I just screwed up after I passed him back. I went in there to protect the line a little bit, but I still went in there with corner speed – and bottomed the front and tucked the front.

Kurtis Roberts, Sunday, DNF
Early on, when I was in the lead in the beginning, it started to skip gears again. I thought Mat (Mladin) was going to run into me a few times and it finally just disintegrated. It was doing the same thing yesterday. Not quite as bad, but today it just came completely apart at the end. It would miss gears on the upshift and it would skip too. It was doing all kinds of weird stuff.

Saturday Superbike:
1. Mat Mladin (Suzuki)
2. Jason Pridmore (Suzuki)
3. Miguel Duhamel (Suzuki)
4. Ben Bostrom (Honda)
5. Aaron Yates (Suzuki)
6. Giovanni Bussei (Ducati)
7. Kurtis Roberts (Honda)
8. Shawn Higbee (Suzuki)
9. Geoff May (Suzuki)
10. Mike Ciccotto (Suzuki)

Sunday Superbike:
1. Mat Mladin (Suzuki)
2. Jason Pridmore (Suzuki)
3. Ben Bostrom (Honda)
4. Aaron Yates (Suzuki)
5. Jordan Szoke (Suzuki)
6. Giovanni Bussei (Ducati)
7. Shawn Higbee (Suzuki)
8. Geoff May (Suzuki)
9. Vincent Haskovec (Suzuki)
10. Mike Ciccotto (Suzuki)

Superbike Championship:
1. Mat Mladin (Suzuki) 431
2. Aaron Yates (Suzuki) 398
3. Ben Bostrom (Honda) 376
4. Eric Bostrom (Kawasaki) 350
5. Kurtis Roberts (Honda) 340
6. Miguel Duhamel (Honda) 332
7. Jason Pridmore (Suzuki) 315
8. Shawn Higbee (Suzuki) 299
9. Vincent Haskovec (Suzuki) 221
10. Jordan Szoke (Suzuki) 212


More, from another press release issued by American Honda, and no, we don’t know why they send out two different releases from the same race weekend:

AMA/Chevy Trucks U.S. Superbike Series
Rounds 13: Lexington, Ohio
July 26, 2003

Mid-Ohio Race One a Heartbreaker for Roberts, Duhamel third

A Kurtis Roberts Superbike win seemed closer than ever on the 26th and final lap of competition during race one action at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course. Before completing the final lap, the Erion Honda rider and Mat Mladin had exchanged the lead several times, but after Mladin ran wide in turn seven Roberts got the drive out of the corner that he needed to take his Honda RC51 to the checkered flag. In the following corner with Mladin still hot on his heels and only a short portion of the racetrack separating him from victory, Roberts lost the front end and slid across the Mid-Ohio run-off. The disappointing low-side ended an exciting race-long battle between the two riders, but even worse it prevented Roberts from enjoying his first ever Superbike victory. Remarkably he was able to remount and still finish seventh.

“I felt really good all weekend,” explained Roberts. “There were a number of places where I could get around Mat (Mladin), and I was just waiting to see what developed. When I crashed, I had a bigger lead on him than I thought, and I just ran it in too hard and made a mistake.”

Those present to witness the scuffle between Roberts and Mladin dubbed it the race of the year and they got it in two doses after debris on the 2.4-mile race track forced a red flag on the 18th lap. Up to that point Roberts, who qualified second, had already engaged himself in a battle for the lead with Mladin. The restart set up a short sprint to the 26th lap that only heightened the competition between the two Superbike front runners and even made the race behind them more interesting.

While the podium seemed to be a lock for Roberts, Mladin and third place Jason Pridmore, the battle for fourth place was still up for grabs. Red Riders Ben Bostrom and Miguel Duhamel found themselves in a heated battle after the restart. The Bostrom and Duhamel dog fight was nearly as exciting as the battle for the lead but also allowed Pridmore the cushion that he needed to secure what was then thought to be third place. After the Roberts mishap, Pridmore inherited second place. Meanwhile, Duhamel finally made a pass stick on teammate Bostrom with just over a lap remaining. The end result was a third place finish for the #17 RC51.

Duhamel, a two-time Superbike winner at Mid-Ohio, started the race next to Roberts on the front row. In the early laps he ran as high as third place, however as the event approached its mid-point Duhamel found himself back in fifth. The race stoppage turned out to be a blessing for the Duhamel effort as crew chief Al Ludington was able to make some changes to the factory Honda RC51 that allowed his rider to charge harder after the restart.

“That’s not the way I would choose to finish third,” said Duhamel about taking the final podium position due to Roberts’ crash. “I guess it just goes to show that anything can happen out here. The restart really worked to our advantage because Al (Ludington) was able to get me out there on a better set-up.”

Even though Duhamel beat him to the line, Bostrom’s fourth place finish was one of his best this season. The #155 RC51 qualified seventh and started from second row before working his way to inside the top five. Bostrom’s fourth place finish advanced the Californian to fourth in the series point standings, just three points behind his brother Eric, who sat out the event due to injuries. Roberts’ crash dropped him to fifth, a mere two points behind teammate Bostrom.

Roberts has already proven he can win in Ohio. Prior to this year’s event, the talented Californian has enjoyed three victories in three different classes at Mid-Ohio. Since 1998 Roberts has won the 250 GP, 600 Supersport and Formula Xtreme classes at Mid-Ohio; all aboard Hondas. Roberts is well aware that there’s still one class left to win at Mid-Ohio and with the second race of a double-header weekend still in the forecast, it may be just around the corner.


AMA/Chevy Trucks U.S. Superbike Series
Rounds 14: Lexington, Ohio
July 27, 2003

Bostrom Takes Third In Second Mid-Ohio Superbike Race

There’s no doubt that Erion Honda’s Kurtis Roberts would rather forget his weekend at Lexington’s Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course. After coming within a few corners of winning his first Superbike race on Saturday and instead low-siding in turn eight, Roberts came out swinging in race two of the double-header weekend, determined to make up for Saturday’s heartbreak. The second race played out similar to the first; Roberts and Mat Mladin built up a huge lead over the field, and battled for the lead for nearly the entire 26-lap event. But this time, instead of the race coming down to a nail-biting final lap, Roberts’ day ended prematurely when shifting problems in his Honda RC51 led to an eventual DNF.

“In the second race, I had shifting problems from the first lap, and it just got progressively worse,” explained Roberts.

The Erion Honda rider battled Mladin until pulling out in the final few laps. Just like in race one, Jason Pridmore was there to swipe up second place. The final podium position in race two played out much differently than in the previous day. Absent from the mix was Miguel Duhamel, whose third place finish on Saturday could not be replicated after a crash on the first lap put an end to his race.

“I cannot believe how fast that back end stepped out,” said Duhamel, explaining his first-lap high-side. “It was like I hit something on the track, a seam or something. The back stepped out so violently that it took the front end with it. I know exactly what happened, I just don’t know why. My hat’s off to Kurtis, though. He rode great this weekend.”

With Duhamel watching the race from the pit wall and Kurtis eventually a non-factor in the final results, that left Ben Bostrom, the lone Red Rider, to fly the Honda flag in Sunday’s final. Bostrom didn’t disappoint, especially when he came out on top of a late race squirmish with Aaron Yates. The 29-year old Bostrom crossed the stripe in third place, gaining valuable points on Yates, who currently sits second in the point standings. Bostrom, who has posted consistent finishes all year, moved up to third on the leader board after a fourth place finish in race one.

Bostrom shared Duhamel’s race one sentiments when he said, “I’d rather take third place by racing with Mat (Mladin) and Kurtis (Roberts). That’s hard to do when you start on the second row. I’ll have to make sure I start up front with them next time.”

With four rounds remaining in the series, the Red Riders now head to Alton, Virginia’s Virginia International Raceway (VIR), a relatively new racetrack on the Superbike circuit. Since being placed on the AMA schedule in 2001, Honda’s Nicky Hayden has won the event twice. Roberts, Bostrom and Duhamel plan to keep Honda on top at VIR in what should be another exiting double-header weekend.

Formula Xtreme Series
Round 8: Lexington, Ohio
July 27, 2003

Zemke Xtreme Runner-up

The Formula Xtreme race was the final event in a long, hot weekend of racing at the Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course in Lexington, Ohio. Already victorious in the 600 Supersport Final, Erion Honda’s Jake Zemke made a valiant attempt to pull off a double win for the weekend, but he came up 4.09 seconds short at the completion of the 16th and final lap of the Formula Xtreme event. Pole setter Ben Spies led the race from start to finish, while Zemke made up the deficit of starting from the fifth position on the grid.

As the snarling pack of riders closed in on the first turn of the race, Zemke soon found himself battling with a handful of other front-runners. By the time the racers flashed past the start-finish line for the first time, Zemke was already engaged in a fierce three-man duel as he pressed to move up from his third-place position. The right to lead this knot of riders see-sawed back and forth a number of times before Zemke took over second place for good at about the midway point of the race. Unfortunately, by that time Spies had long since departed, and although young Jake continued to hammer out fast lap times, he could not mount a challenge for the race win.

“The weekend turned out okay I guess,” said Zemke after the race. “You would have never guessed it if you talked to me Friday, Saturday, or even this morning.”

Zemke was quite frank about his qualifying and practice times not being up to par with the front-runners in the class, but when race time rolled around, the Honda CBR954RR pilot concentrated on the task at hand and claimed his sixth Formula Xtreme podium finish in eight rounds. The event capped off what turned out to be a very successful weekend for the 28-year old Californian. The runner-up finish allowed him to nail down third place in the series point standings and also helped him gain ground on second place on the leader board.

Bruce Transportation Honda’s Marty Craggill had a much better outing in the Formula Xtreme race than he did in the earlier 600 Supersport Final – an event that saw him crash out in the early going. Aboard the #134 CBR954RR in the Formula Xtreme Final, Craggill maintained the eighth position for much of the race before ultimately finishing there. Meanwhile, Erion Honda’s Roger Lee Hayden fell victim to mechanical gremlins and did not finish the race.

Round nine of the Formula Xtreme Series will take place on August 29-31 at Virginia International Raceway, a 2.26-mile road course well suited to the Red Riders and their potent CBR954RR race machines.

AMA/Pro Honda Oils 600cc Supersport Series
Round 9: Lexington, Ohio
July 27, 2003

Zemke Victorious in Mid-Ohio 600 Supersport

In the last decade, Red Riders have dominated the 600 Supersport class at the famed 2.4-mile Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course. The Honda CBR600 continued its stranglehold on Mid-Ohio competition this weekend when Erion Honda’s Jake Zemke put his #98 CBR600RR on top of a four-rider duel that ended with a mere 0.770-second gap separating first through fourth place. The highly anticipated race win for Zemke comes after a second-place finish in the previous round at Laguna Seca Raceway and appears to be a turning point for Jake in a season already filled with drama.

Going into Sunday’s Supersport Final, Zemke was actually experiencing more drama than he would have liked. Between Zemke, Erion teammate Roger Hayden and Team Honda’s Miguel Duhamel, Zemke was the slowest in qualifying. Duhamel and Hayden qualified fifth and seventh, while Zemke, Erion Honda’s Alex Gobert and Bruce Transportation’s Marty Craggill were even further back in 10th, 11th and 13th, respectively.

Despite his second-row starting position, Hayden launched his #95 Honda CBR600RR into the lead as the track went green. The fast-starting Kentuckian held onto the point for the first two laps before being overtaken by Jamie Hacking and Damon Buckmaster.

Meanwhile, Zemke pressed forward to sixth place by the end of the first lap, then took over third place on lap six of the 16-lap affair. Hayden would eventually finish seventh, only 7.7 seconds behind race winner Zemke.

As Zemke closed on the Hacking/Buckmaster battle up front, Miguel Duhamel was making time after suffering a dismal start. Duhamel, a mainstay in the CBR600’s domination at Mid-Ohio over the years, worked his way up to eighth place on the seventh lap of race. Unfortunately, on the very next lap, Duhamel found himself on the ground.

“The front end was pretty soft, and I just bottomed it going into that turn and lost it,” Duhamel explained after the race. “It’s too bad too because the race pace wasn’t that fast and I thought we were in pretty good shape to get up there.”

A lap after Duhamel’s crash, Zemke seized the lead and turned up the heat, maintaining a pace that forestalled any counterattacks from Hacking, Buckmaster and Ben Spies, who had followed the fast-moving Zemke up to the lead pack earlier in the race. When the train of four riders crossed the stripe for the 16th and final time, Zemke out-dragged second place Hacking to the checkers by a scant 0.59 of a second with Buckmaster and Spies finishing third and fourth.

Hayden was the next Honda to cross the finish line, in seventh, while Gobert brought his #23 CBR600RR home in 11th. Unfortunately, Duhamel wasn’t the only Red Rider to suffer a crash in the Supersport Final. The first was actually Craggill, who went down on the fourth lap in the middle of his own charge through the pack. Luckily, the crash left Craggill uninjured and he was able to compete in the Formula Xtreme Final later in the afternoon.

Zemke’s race win moved the one-time dirt tracker to fifth in the series point standings, just behind teammate Alex Gobert. With only two rounds remaining, the series championship is out of reach for Zemke, Gobert and the rest of the Red Riders, but they still plan on winning races visiting the podium as the series heads east to Virginia International Raceway in Alton, Virginia on August 29-31.