Seeping Matter

World Superbike USA weekend is nearly here and I can hardly wait.  (Since I can barely concentrate I figure I may as well blog about it.)  Derrick and I will be in attendance.  This year we’re sitting in the Paddock Grandstand at Miller Motorsports Park, which should be a very interesting and awesome change from where we have always been up to this year, down by the Tooele turn.

By the way, there is still time for you to get here, if you hurry.

Anyway, the last couple of years Derrick hasn’t been up for autograph hunting.  But since we’re going multiple days this year maybe I can talk him into it.  Here’s some of the autographs I’d like to collect:

• Sterilgarda Yamaha’s James Toseland, two-time World Superbike Champion
• Alitalia Aprilia’s Max Biaggi, former 250cc World Champion
• BMW Motorrad Motorsport’s Troy Corser, former Australian and AMA Superbike Champion
• Xerox Ducati’s Michel Fabrizio
• Alstare Suzuki’s Leon Haslam

As long as I’m dreaming, we might as well throw in Troy Bayliss (three-time World Superbike Champion), Nicky Hayden (former AMA Superbike and MotoGP Champion), and Ben Spies (three-time AMA Superbike and current World Superbike Champion).  Maybe they’ll be there, you know, to visit, and meet me and all that.

Forecast is for rain on Saturday, which should make practice a bit difficult, but it looks like Sunday and Monday will be great days.  Can’t think of anything more awesome to do on Memorial Day than watch World Superbike racing, and also think of my grandma who passed away a few years ago, and hates racing.

Since World Superbike at Miller Motorsports Park is coming up, I thought it appropriate to make a list of the ten motorcycles I need to be happy.  World Superbike is May 29-31 at MMSP.  Of course you already knew that, because you already have your tickets.

You do have your tickets, right?  RIGHT?

Anyway, I’m not sure if all of these will make me happy, but they sure won’t hurt.  Definitely, I can’t be happy without them.  I believe that requires no explanation.

Ducati 1098 R Bayliss Edition (source: cbbtrader.com)

Aprilia RSV4 Factory (source: sportrider.com)

MV Agusta F4 Senna (source: hayabusa.org)

BMW S 1000 RR (source: mcnews.com.au)

Triumph Daytona 675 (source: motortopia.com)

Suzuki GSXR 750 (source: centre-sports.com)

Ducati Monster 1100S (source: totalmotorcycle.com)

Harley-Davidson V-Rod (source: totalmotorcycle.com)

Honda VTX1800F (source: totalmotorcycle.com)

Suzuki RM-Z 450 (source: dirtbikebitz.com)

This announcement for the 2010 World Superbike USA weekend, to be formal, sounds freaking awesome.  Part of the announcement describes a concert that is included with the ticket price, featuring Foreigner, Styx, Kansas, and “a possible surprise addition to be named later.”

So obviously there will definitely be another band that is even more awesome than those three, as hard as that is to believe.

Derrick and I already have our weekend tickets, so now we are speculating who the fourth band will be.  The key traits for selection are:

• Awesomeness
• I like them
• I want them to come
• Pure awesomeness

Here are the top five obvious and likely candidates:

• Def Leppard — Def Leppard has toured with Styx and Foreigner within the past few years so they are a strong candidate to come again.  And they are awesome.
• Journey — Journey has also toured with Styx, in particular, in the past.  Plus they are awesome.
• Rush — Rush, pretty much the only good Canadian export, got snubbed by Canada when they didn’t get invited to perform at the Olympics.  Also, awesome.
• Van Halen — I haven’t seen Van Halen since 2007.  And even back then they didn’t come to Utah.  They probably feel bad about this and so are planning to come for World Superbike.  And awesome.
• Pink Floyd — The most likely candidate, both due to awesomeness and due to not having performed for like 15 years.  Also, they are from Europe which means that, unlike you, they’ve actually heard of World Superbike.

It’s unlikely that all five of these bands will come, but hey, you never know.

This week Yamaha announced a scale-back of their factory racing efforts in North America, specifically, for AMA Supercross, AMA Motocross, and AMA Road Racing.  Yamaha partners, or “satellite teams” in racing vernacular, will carry forward Yamaha’s racing efforts in these areas.

For AMA Supercross and AMA Motocross, L&M Racing will carry the Yamaha torch along with other satellite teams (think Mach3 or Yamaha of Troy or the like).  This makes sense; Yamaha’s factory team this year was a bust, whilst James Stewart for L&M won the 450 Supercross title.  Satellite teams with factory support have proven to be extremely competitive in these series and in fact have won quite their fair share of titles.

Not so in AMA Road Racing.  Satellite teams in AMA may have varying degrees of success, but the factory teams have historically pretty much ruled the roost in AMA Superbike, for example.

Last year, when it was announced by the AMA that the Daytona Motorsports Group was going to destroy AMA road racing once and for all, Honda followed with an announcement of their own, stating a new plan wherein Honda would no longer have a factory team, but instead would let the satellite team Corona Honda carry the Honda torch.

Gee, this sounds an awful lot like Yamaha’s announcement this week that Graves Yamaha will be the primary Yamaha road racing team in North America.  In fact, you could almost accomplish this press release with a little bit of simple find-and-replace word substitution (Honda->Yamaha, Corona->Graves).

Where does this lead?  Well, in Honda’s case, one year later they announced that they were pulling out of AMA Road Racing indefinitely, because the DMG has screwed up AMA Road Racing so badly.  Of course, this is my interpretation; here’s exactly what Honda said:  “Regrettably the current AMA/DMG racing environment does not align with our company goals.”

In other words, “NASBike is not really what we had in mind.”

It isn’t like Honda doesn’t know how to win in road racing.  It was just a few years ago that Nicky Hayden won the MotoGP title for Repsol Honda, and a handful of AMA titles before that.  Even more recently, James Toseland took the World Superbike title for Ten Kate Honda.  When they pulled out, Honda was very competitive in AMA Road Racing also.  This isn’t Kawasaki we’re talking about here.

The move to from full factory effort to pure satellite support was prompted by DMG’s promise to ruin AMA Road Racing.  After a one-year trial, that immediately led to them pulling out of AMA Road Racing altogether.  It is important to note that they are still fully involved in World Superbike and MotoGP.  It isn’t that they don’t believe in road racing; they don’t believe in NASBike.

Now it appears Yamaha is on a similar path.  Eerily similar, in fact.  Their AMA effort was beyond competitive — some might say “dominant” — toward the end of the season this year.  And of course, Yamaha took the World Superbike, World Supersport, and MotoGP titles this year.  Yet they are pulling back in almost the exact same way Honda did last year.

Fast forward one year, and I will be completely not surprised to hear that Yamaha, too, is pulling out of AMA Road Racing.  In fact, I’ll be surprised if it takes that long.

So, with Honda gone, Yamaha on their way out, who is left?  Not Buell, the American make that the whole messed up class structure was presumably created for, since Harley-Davidson has announced the discontinuation of that make.  Ducati, incredibly strong in both World Superbike and MotoGP, has hardly any presence in AMA Road Racing.  And now that Mat Mladin has retired, you have to wonder how much longer NASBike can last.

Will DMG finally realize their stupidity and repent of their grievous sin?  Or are they too proud to change, and instead they will continue to drive AMA Road Racing into oblivion?  Perhaps I should have more faith, but I’m a realist, not an optimist.  If I were you, I wouldn’t buy my tickets too far in advance, if you buy them at all.

Ooh, that title has a nice sound to it.

Ben Spies Tipping It In. Image Source: www.superstreetbike.com

Yesterday in Portimão, the last stop on the 2009 World Superbike tour, Yamaha’s Ben Spies came from ten points behind to clinch the 2009 World Superbike title from the clutches of Ducati’s Noriyuki Haga.  I had to skip recording the afternoon NFL game just so I could get the World Superbike broadcasts right away.  I had to skip the Sunday evening sports get-together with the neighborhood buddies in order to watch the races instead.  And I must admit I cheered, jumped right out of my chair and clapped vigorously when Haga low-sided in Race 1.

You could say that it pleases me that he won.

In his rookie season, Spies took a record 11 poles, including a record seven in a row, and 14 wins.  I was at Miller Motorsports Park last May when he broke the record for consecutive pole positions.  It was dang awesome to be there, at the only American stop in the World Superbike tour, cheering on the only American in World Superbike.

It’s something we miss here in America.  Sure, there’s some American things that are fine, like college football, and some that are just flat-out lame, like NASCAR.  Regardless, we get so wrapped up in our own little world here that we miss out on the really great things going on in the rest of the world.  It’s too bad we are so lame like that.

I have bittersweet feelings about Ben moving on to MotoGP.  I think he could be a dominant force in World Superbike for many seasons to come if he would stay.  At the same time, MotoGP is the pinnacle of motorcycle road racing, and he definitely deserves this opportunity to take a shot at the very best the world has to offer.  Tech3 Yamaha is not exactly a factory MotoGP team, but it is probably the best satellite team in MotoGP.  Hopefully this is just the beginning.

Once upon a time, there was a nice young man named AMA Superbike.  He really looked up to his big brother, named World.  In fact, AMA really wanted to grow up to be just like World.  So he tried to emulate his big brother in every way.

His big brother had some great friends, with names like Honda, Suzuki, Yamaha, and Kawasaki.  AMA also made friends with these people.

World was really into motorcycle racing.  AMA was really into motorcycle racing too.

World Superbike worked with his friends Honda, Suzuki, Yamaha, and Kawasaki to create a racing series based on 600cc and 1000cc production sport bikes.  This helped his friends to produce more powerful, better handling, higher quality motorcycles for their customers.  And it helped World create a great racing series that racing fans not only loved but could identify with, because they knew they could go out and buy bikes almost just like those to ride themselves.  When AMA saw how great the World Superbike racing series was, AMA worked with those same friends to create a racing series too.  The AMA Superbike racing series was great also.

Everything was great.  World Superbike had a great racing series, and so did AMA Superbike.  World Superbike had millions of great fans, and so did AMA Superbike; in fact, they shared many of the same fans.  World Superbike had many great riders, and so did AMA Superbike; in fact, some riders used to move from one series to the other.

Then, one day on his way home from school, AMA met a very bad person named DMG.

At first, he tried not to be friends with DMG.  After all, he knew DMG’s reputation.  He knew that DMG was responsible for turning NASCAR stock car racing, which used to race cars that were actually based on stock cars, into such a pathetic form of racing that it was the laughing stock of the auto racing world.

But DMG was persistent and persuasive.  DMG kept telling AMA that it wouldn’t hurt to be friends.  DMG kept saying how many fans NASCAR had, and conveniently avoided the fact that most NASCAR fans are drunk redneck alcoholics that don’t even pay attention to the race.  DMG kept saying how many racers NASCAR had, and conveniently avoided the fact that none of them really had that much racing talent.

AMA knew he should not be friends with DMG.  But despite knowing better, he gave into temptation.  He started hanging out with DMG even though he knew he shouldn’t.

World said he should not do this.  ”Don’t be fooled by DMG,” said World.  ”He doesn’t know anything about racing — especially motorcycle racing.  He will ruin your life!”

Suddenly, AMA reacted in a way he never had before.  ”You are not the boss of me!” he shouted.  ”You can’t tell me what to do!  I can do whatever I want!”

AMA stormed out of the house.  With nowhere to go, he went over to DMG’s house.  ”Wow, World must not be that good of a friend to treat you that way,” said DMG sympathetically.  ”I would never treat you that way.”

“What should I do?” asked AMA.  ”I don’t understand why World doesn’t want us to be friends.”

DMG replied, “He just doesn’t appreciate you.  You’re better than him!  Trust me.  You don’t need that dumb old World Superbike!  I’ll show you how to make a really great racing series!”

Unfortunately, AMA listened to DMG.  He changed his entire racing series from a proven successful formula to something most of his former fans now refer to as NASBike.  He turned his back on his friends like Honda, Suzuki, Yamaha, and Kawasaki.  In fact, once he moved away from World Superbike and started hanging out with DMG, Honda said that he could not be friends with AMA anymore.  AMA’s three-time champion left to race for World instead, and AMA’s former seven-time champion said he wouldn’t race anymore if AMA didn’t quit being friends with DMG.  A year later, he retired for good.

Despite all of this, AMA wouldn’t stay away from DMG.  Before, AMA looked up to World and wanted to be like him; now, for some reason AMA thought he was better than World, and felt for some reason like this was important.  So AMA wouldn’t race at the best tracks if World was also there at the same time.  AMA would sometimes wait a month or more to show television coverage of their races.  And the new race format was so confusing and ridiculous that nobody could understand it.

Before too long, everyone who used to be friends with AMA forgot about him.  Everyone except DMG.  Everyone else forgot about him, because he forgot about all of them.  They all just became friends with World instead, and forgot that AMA was even there anymore.

And that was how AMA went from being awesome to nothing in just one year.  And he lived miserably ever after.  The End.

Moral

The moral of this story is:  DMG bites.

Update:

I sent a link to this post to the AMA with the following message:

To Whom It May Concern:

Thought you might be interested to read my latest blog post on AMA Pro Road Racing (http://blog.mvryan.org/2009/10/the-sad-tale-of-ama-superbike-a-bedtime-fable/), which was written not so much as a bash session, but more as an interesting retrospective.
I learned one very interesting thing about myself writing it.  I’ve lived in Utah for over 9 years.  I’ve attended every single AMA Supercross in Salt Lake, as well as others nearby.  I’ve attended every AMA and World Superbike event at Miller Motorsports Park since the track opened.  I watch every AMA Supercross, AMA Motocross, World Superbike, MotoGP, and Formula One race on TV.  You could say I’m a racing fan.
I also used to watch every AMA road racing event on TV.  That is, up until this year.  I watched the first event, but when I couldn’t make any sense of the classes, had to wait for (sometimes several) weeks to watch the events on TV, and when you refused to come to Miller’s this year, I completely lost interest.
That’s what I found interesting:  Between you and DMG, you messed it up so much, in fact, that I, a true racing fan, completely forgot the series was even going on.  Note, I did not actively choose to boycott in protest of the changes.  The changes you made had the effect of causing me to lose interest.  I don’t care about the series anymore – it is as uninteresting to me as a club racing series in another part of the country.
So there’s some feedback for you.  If your intent was to gain fans, well, it seems what you did was exactly the opposite.

I’ll let you know if I hear from them.

What was the first car you ever rode in?  You know, the car that brought you home from the hospital after you were born? In my case, it was a 1970 Boss 302 Mustang that looked exactly like this one.

1970 Boss 302 Mustang = Awesome

This ruined me for life.

There wasn’t too much I could do about this while I was growing up.  I couldn’t afford my own car (or motorcycle) even after I was old enough to drive.  So mostly I would just ride my 20″ Redline around, in full aero tuck down big hills until that time I lost my balance, crashed, and broke my fall with my face.

Now as an grown-up, or at least an adult, silencing this addiction is much harder.  I’ve been to supercross races, motocross races, NASCAR races, ALMS races, World Superbike races, and AMA Superbike races before the Daytona Motorsports Group ruined it.  I watch every Formula One, World Superbike, and MotoGP race that gets televised.  This helps but doesn’t fully address the problem.

So about ten years ago, I bought myself a used 1988 Honda CRX Si with my annual bonus from IBM.  This car was not pretty at all.  But it was fun to drive, and pretty fast.  This really helped my addiction problem. Then the CRX died.  That was a sad, sad day.

I bought my 1998 Kawasaki KX-250 to feed the addiction.  And boy, it works.  My adrenaline rushes every time I throw my leg over and kick it started.  I shift into first, crack the throttle about 1/4 open, and release the clutch and that thing will climb through the gears just about as fast as I can shift.  What can compare to motorcycle acceleration? Nothing.  Well, a Ferrari, I guess, or a Corvette.  But I can’t afford a Ferrari – not yet, anyway. So yeah, my motorcycle will address this problem, except I never get to ride it.  It’s too hard to get enough free time all together to go ride.

So my addiction is not getting fed again. Which is why I test drove this.

2003 Nissan 350Z Track Model = Awesome

Boy, am I in trouble. My only hope is that someone buys it before I break down and get it myself.

P.S. I stole that picture from Innovative Motors, I hope they don’t mind too much.

Ducati is to motorcycles what Ferrari is to cars – a dominant Italian world champion many times over

… mmmmm, Ducati …

Is it possible that the Aprilia RSV4 Factory is even better looking than the Ducati 1098R?

Is it possible that the new BMW S1000 RR is as awesome as it looks?
Oh, those are the Germans, in the background, that sat next to us in the Tooele grandstand. Pure coincidence.

WorldSBK made it’s only North American stop last weekend at Miller Motorsports Park (MMP).  I think it goes without saying that I was in attendance to witness the Awesome.  And also the Dumb.  Unfortunately I don’t think WorldSBK can come to Utah without some Dumb included in there.  So without further adieu, the Dumb and the Awesome of WorldSBK at MMP:

• AWESOME – The track.  To say that this facility is world-class is, I think, an understatement.  It is not only the best road course in North America, it is probably one of the very best in the world.
• DUMB – Utah people who do not attend.  These same people think that BYU is a national-championship-caliber football team every single year but don’t even care to come to the track to watch the best superbike racers in the entire world compete.
• AWESOME – Great attendance from out of state.  I met really cool people from California, Minnesota, and even sat next to some guys who spoke German.  Thanks for coming, and I hope to see you again next year!
• DUMB – The family that sat next to me who painted BYU logos on their kids faces before they came to the track.  Yes, really.  What the freak?  Stop it – you guys are embarrassing me!
• AWESOME – Ben Spies winning a world-record seventh pole in a row in his rookie season, and then taking the double at home.  In his rookie season, Spies has yet to NOT win pole.  Incredible.
• DUMB – Not having any racing of any consequence on Saturday.  Help me out here, people.
• AWESOME – Watching motorcycles fly by your face at 200 mph.  You don’t realize how fast this is until you watch it.  I realize you think you know.  You don’t.
• DUMB – No AMA presence.  I heard they pulled out of going to MMP at the last minute because they heard they would not be the headlining act.  Uh, AMA?  You would never be a headlining act over WorldSBK at any facility – but especially not since the freaking stupid DMG started turning it into “NASBike” (and a big shout-out to the guy from Minnesota that gave me this term, I love it).  So the AMA (DMG?) refuses to race at the best track on the circuit because WorldSBK is there the same week?  L-A-M-E.  Although, this is what we’ve come to expect from the new NASBike.  I mean, nothing else they’ve done so far makes any sense – it only stands to reason then that they’d also choose to not race at MMP, which also makes no sense.
• AWESOME – Walking through the pits and talking to the mechanics as they are making repairs to factory World Supersport bikes.
• DUMB – Waiting fifteen minutes for the shuttle to take me from the Tooele Grandstand around the track to the paddock.  I could almost walk that far in that much time, and that’s saying something, because it is a long, long way around.
• AWESOME – A killer vendor area with a really strong showing by BMW, Aprilia, and Ducati as well as Honda and Yamaha.  European sportbikes are TO DIE FOR.
• DUMB – Ducati bikini girls.  I didn’t even notice them at all, but for the record I think they are really, really dumb, and not good-looking at all, and they absolutely do not make me want to visit the Ducati tent or buy an awesome new Ducati 1098 R Baylisss Limited Edition, in case my wife reads my blog.

Former World Superbike Champion Troy Bayliss got the unfortunate chance to show off his awesome dance moves right after a hair-raising high side exiting Release during race 1 at Miller Motorsports Park. My heart was in my throat as I watched him, sitting there in the middle of the racing line, with bikes racing by on either side. I couldn’t help but exclaim, “Troy – get up! Get out of there!!” as I watched him try to make his way off the track.
I’m glad you’re ok, Troy. Awesome dance moves there on the straightaway by one of my favorite riders ever.