Copyright 2002, Roadracing World Publishing, Inc.

The underweight wheel on Road Atlanta Supersport winner Jamie Hacking’s Suzuki GSX-R600 was off a pre-production 2000 GSX-R750.

Initial reports that the wheel was from a 1999 GSX-R750 were incorrect.

The ultra-light rear wheels seen on pre-production prototype 2000 GSX-R750s never went into production because they were too easy to bend in street use, according to inside sources.

Several race teams received pre-production 2000 GSX-R750s to use in racebike development. One of the wheels from such a bike ended up by mistake on the wheel rack for Hacking’s Supersport team and was used on the bike at Road Atlanta, the sources said. The wheel should have been destroyed in 2000.

The pre-production wheels have visibly larger cut-outs and are signicantly lighter, and can easily be spotted by anyone who knows what they’re looking at.

Website reports that the wheel in question was a stock GSX-R600 wheel that had been lightened on the inside of the rim were pure fiction, according to AMA Pro Racing sources.

Hacking was docked 10 points and the Yoshimura Blimpie Suzuki team was fined $2000 for running the lighter-than-stock wheel.