World Superbike

Olaf Wolff
All About Bikes Sr. Staff-Writer

On this day, in the country where design and style rules, on a track that had every reason to believe it had seen it all – victory and the agony of defeat were redesigned. Beneath celebrated Italian skies producing faultless track conditions, over 118,000 fans witnessed perhaps the finest racing ever on the legendary Monza circuit. And, as if by sheer will of design, Italian Michel Fabrizio aboard a Ducati, shone through brilliantly as a creditable new challenger to the throne.

Race 1

The first race saw Fabrizio take the hole shot with Big Ben Spies (Yamaha) and Haga (Ducati) behind him on the early breakaway. However, two crashes at the first chicane, on the first lap, reeled everyone in when the race was red-flagged. Sucked up by the mishaps where Tamada, Hill, Corser, Neukirchner and Roberts. The German, Neukirchner came off the worst with a broken right femur and dislocated right foot, while Roberts picked up various bruises.

After an hour delay the race was on again mirroring nearly an identical start. Fabrizio made it clear immediately when he passed teammate Haga, that this was his house. For the better part of the 18 laps Fabrizio, Haga and Spies put on a mind-boggling racing extravaganza rivaling any contrived Hollywood plot. Shoulder-to-shoulder dueling, lead swaps from first to third in half a heartbeat, producing one record breaking lap time after another. And when the final checkered curtain fell the ending twisted as though written for maximum seat squirming affect. With Spies in command and barely a hundred meters away from his fifth win of the season, the Yamaha gave up the ghost exiting the Parabolica, the last curve. He reportedly ran out of fuel. What the hell?
 
Fabrizio capitalized on Spies' misfortune to take his first win in Superbikes. Teammate Noriyuki Haga finished second to maintain his points lead. The third place battle also saw drama at the finish as Max Biaggi took his Aprilia over the line, but the Italian was penalized 20 seconds for cutting the chicane, leaving Ryuichi Kiyonari (Honda) to take the final podium position.

Fabrizio said about the race: "Well, I really didn't expect this win, even though I'd been up at the front for the past two days. I had a small problem when the gearing hit neutral after Ben and I touched and I was not able to find second. He got away a bit from me but I thought I had to fight until the very end because I was convinced I could do it. But I think his fuel finished, a real pity for him."

Race 2

In the second race, juiced by the gut-wrenching results of the first, and out to leave little doubt about who the fastest motorcycle racer on the planet was, the long, tall, Texan dominated from start to finish.

This is not how races go at Monza, they’re assumed to be dogfights, by racers with experience and earned stripes. You’re not supposed to race here for the first time and totally blow away the field. Spies didn’t get that email it appears. At one point Spies had nearly a six second lead, allowing him to throw the switch on the handlebars that signals the onboard computer it was all right to run on a fuel-conserving program now. Note to Yamaha, whatever bonus you promised to Spies for a double victory – give it to him. You’re going to want him to resign next season.

With this win and Hagas’ crash at the Parabolica on lap 3, when a bird hit him, the championship battle has been cracked wide open. Fabrizio now becomes a convincing title candidate after crowning his Italian weekend with a superb second place to go with his win. Fabrizio managed to hold off Ryuichi Kiyonari in the final stages, the Japanese rider repeating his third place race one result.

After the race Spies had this to say to a reporter commenting on what might have been had he not run out of fuel, "What could have been, that was a tough pill to swallow. We put our head down in race 2 and had to get into a good rhythm in the first 12 or 14 laps because we were obviously having a problem at the end of the race. I had to slow down and do the short-shifting trick and make sure everything was good till the end."