Kyalami once again played host to World Superbikes but unfortunately this is the last time we are likely to see the series in South Africa. Political wrangling has seen the Gauteng government change and the new incumbents immediately cancelled the five-year contract. Cynics believe that this smacks of racism as motorcycle racing is not seen as a popular sport among black people (read ANC voters).

Anyway politics aside, the event was brilliantly organized and run and the WSBK organisers –infornt – were suitably impressed. One of the reasons that this is the best International motor race for South Africa to host is that it gives local competitors a chance to compete on the world stage. That would be impossible with Formula 1 or even Moto GP.

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We managed to field three local competitors this year, one in Superbike and two in Supersport. Our local hero Sheridan Morais was aboard the factory Aprilia and performed admirably. His 13^th place finish in race 1 put him ahead of big names like Ruben Xaus, Shakey Byrne and even Noriyuki Haga. And before you go claiming local knowledge played into his hands, think again. These are professional racers at the top of their game, by the end of the first practice; all of the competitors have worked the track out. No, Shez is just as good as the rest of the field and if he could get a break, he would be regularly rubbing fairings at the front of the field.

Ronan Quarmby and Lance Isaacs were our two local hopefuls in the 600cc Supersport race. Ronan went out determined to show the world that has got what it takes. He spent all of Friday right up there with the best on the timesheets. But in a bizaare turn of events, he crashed late on Friday afternoon. The crash revealed a cyst in his leg, which put him out of action for the rest of the weekend and may even put him out of racing for the rest of the year. Bitter disappointment indeed. His good friend Jacques Peskins took his place on the bike for the rest of the weekend. Lance Isaacs who is no stranger to international competition rode consistently and finished 11^th in the race on Sunday.

Kyalami is not a track that usually produces close motorcycle racing and race 1 was no exception to the rule. Michel Fabrizio ran away at the front with Carlos Checa running in 2^nd place and Leon Haslam in 3rd. The race was more of precession than anything else with very little wheel-to-wheel action.

The Supersport race was again a bit of a precession with Irish sensation Eugene Laverty disappearing ahead of Keenan Sofuoglu. Chas Davies rode a brilliant race to take the last podium slot on the glorious sounding Triumph. Several of the regular front runners seemed to struggle with Lascorz finishing 6th and Fujiwara down in 12th spot behind Lance Isaacs

Superbike Race 2 was a complete turn around, not only was it a brilliant close race with several bikes fighting for the lead, Fabrizio was well down the order and Checa running around in 5^th place. Johnathan Rea led the race with Leon Haslam, Max Biaggi, Cal Cruthlow and Carlos Checa in hot pursuit. Biaggi made a couple of attempts to get past towards the end of the race but it was the lucky Haslam that eventually got passed on the second to last lap. Haslam won the race and Rea hung on to second place. Biaggi took the final podium position.

A great weekend of International motorcycle racing in the warm Highveld sunshine, what could be better? I for one will be very sad indeed if this was indeed the last time we’ll see WSBK in South Africa.

The biggest change for me is the move by Davide Tardozzi from Ducati to BMW. I know he says that he was just looking for a new challenge but several commentators believe that he was fired from Ducati for not using team orders to secure the championship for Haga. If that is the case, it does seem like a strange decision. I mean why would you give the most successful manager in the sport the boot rather than just having a quiet word with him. And of course Fabrizio is a talented enough rider to win the championship in his own right so why should he be held back? I wonder how he will cope this year under new management being told not to win races.

All of this is of course a huge benefit to BMW who do have the money and technical expertise. With Tardozzi at the helm and Corsa on the bike, I think it is going to be a strong team. They only fly in the ointment is Xaus who lets be honest hasn’t really been on the same pace as his teammate. I think I would have signed Shakey Burne who was looking for a ride at the time.

Leon Haslam will be on the Alstare Suzuki this year

Aprilia showed impressive form last year considering they had a completely new bike. Sure they have more motorcycle race experience than BMW but it was still an impressive performance. I am expecting big things from the Italian Team this year. Celebrating success in British Superbike, Leon Camier will accompany Max Biaggi as the second rider. I like Leon and he does have the talent. It’s just that Max Biaggi is without question the number one rider and hasn’t been known for working in harmony with teammates.

Yamaha too have a pretty strong line-up. Cal Cruthlow was particularly impressive last year on the Supersport bike although he does need to calm down and stay on the bike more often. Coming back to World Superbike with his tail between his legs is James Toseland. Despite his lack of success in Moto GP, James does have 2 superbike world championships to his name. He may not be as impressive as Ben Spies but he is nevertheless going to win races this year.

Ten Kate Honda with Johnny Rea and Max Neukirchner should be up there with the frontrunners. Johnny is a talent that I have tipped for the top in previous articles. Max on the other hand is a bit less of a sure fire bet. He has shown moments of brilliance but he has spent so much of last season injured that it’s difficult to know if he has the consistency.

Alstare Suzuki has finally given Leon Haslam the ride that he deserves. Strange to see him move away from Honda given the family connection with that manufacturer. He will have Sylvain Guintoli sharing garage space with him.

That covers the “Works” Teams, excluding Kawasaki who I think have a reasonable lineup but I’m not sure they have a competitive bike.  As we have seen before,

privateer teams do often get onto the podium. So it looks like we are in for some good racing. That’s why I haven’t stuck my neck out and predicted a champion. Let us know what you think.

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The laugh is that California has completely banned 2-strokes and as such no 125 or 250 races have been allowed. The fact that the bikes, teams and all of the back-up equipment has to be flown in and the spectators arrive in gas guzzling V8’s is not even considered. No, it’s just those 20 odd laps of the strokers being on track that will certainly destroy the environment.

Anyway we must live with the new rules and embrace Moto 2. The advantage of a 2-stroke engine is that a clever tuner can get the bike to be competitive without spending huge piles of cash and that’s what has kept the racing close. Low budget teams are in with as much of a chance as the big money boys. 4-Strokes on the other hand are expensive to develop and there tends to be a big gap between the big budget teams and the less well funded. Given that there is a single engine rule, the racing should still be close, we’ll have to wait and see.

Ben Spies

Ben Spies having taken the world by storm made a guest appearance in Valencia and several people expected him to be racing wheel to wheel with the factory Yamaha riders. Not so, he did go better than I expected though. After a slow-ish start, he seemed to get the measure of the bike and started to work his way up the field. Nevertheless, not only was he way behind the front-runners, he also didn’t get anywhere near Colin Edwards, his team mate for next year. Let’s not be too hard on Spies though, he may surprise us next year. I do think though that James Toseland will produce far better results in World Superbike than Spies will in Moto GP. Chris Vermeulen on the other hand may have a tougher time on the Kawasaki.

Casey Stoner must feel a little bit silly having topped the tables throughout practice and qualifying. I can’t say for sure but it looked to me like a fundamental mistake highsiding on a cold tyre on the warm up lap. I don’t think Casey himself could believe what had happened. Marco Simoncelli must also be kicking himself, he could have had the honour of being the last ever winner of a 250 race until he lost the front end and ended up in the kitty litter. I’m a big fan of Bradley Smith and it seems that he will be staying on a 125 again next year. I think in his shoes I would have taken the Moto 2 ride that he was offered. Having said that, he is still young and if he wins a world championship next year, it won’t do his career any harm.

Sheridan Morais

Our own Sheridan Morais has almost certainly got a ride With Yamaha France in the World Supersport series next year. As if that wasn’t enough he will also be riding an Aprilia RSV4 in our local Superbike series. We at Drive are big fans of Sheridan and wish him all the best. So, we have to wait until next year for our motorcycle racing fix and it should be interesting in both Moto GP and WSBK. One prediction I will make is that both Bradley Smith and Marco Simoncelli will be fast assuming Marco can stay on the bike. I’m convinced that Sheridan Morais has the ability to take it to the World so we hope to see him as a regular front-runner.

Ben Spies has only ridden one season of Superbike and while he has impressed, he hasn’t won a title and he might not this year. One of the problems is that he has been so fast this year that the world media has led him to believe that he is invincible. The wild card ride at Valencia should give us a clue to his ability on the bike. Yamaha have effectively done a straight swap and brought Toeseland back to Superbikes, as I predicted although it was a bit more roundabout than that, the net result is the same.

Ben certainly rode a brilliant first race at Magney Cours in the first heat and even when he made a mistake, he came straight back and kept Haga behind him. Haga was also impressive showing that he hasn’t lost the fight and still desperately wants the title. The second race was less kind to Spies with, what appeared to be the wrong tyre choice. Fortunes were mixed for Haga. It was fortunate for him that Spies chose the wrong tyre but unfortunate that he didn’t get the advantage he should have. Usually if you get so far ahead of your opponent in Superbikes, there are a lot more riders in between the two. How often is 4^th place 17 seconds behind the winner?

We here at Drive are big fans of our local boy Sheridan Morais so it was disappointing to see a lacklustre performance from him. I still believe he has got what it takes so I hope that doesn’t jeopardise his chances of a ride next year. Wouldn’t it be good to see him on the Factory Kawasaki next year along side Chris Vermeulen?

Sheridan Morais

I tipped Johnny Rea for big things at the beginning of the year but his performance has been inconsistent to say the least. Surprisingly, he seems to have been over riding the bike these last couple of weekends, which only started happening after he re-signed for next year and doesn’t need to impress to stay in the team.

Going back to Moto GP, it was great to see Casey Stoner back even though I’m not really a fan. What I do like to see though is racing and it would appear that there are only four riders capable of winning races, Casey being one of them. I’m not sure what happened to Rossi but I have no doubt that he will be back fighting next race. It does of course, keep the championship alive for a bit longer but I still have my money on the Italian.

How wrong could I have been in my last post? Here I was predicting that Haydon wouldn’t be on the Ducati next year and then he goes and puts in the most spectacular qualifying performance and probably would have translated that into a race result had he not been knocked off the bike. Ben Spies in the meantime has signed for Yamaha so he won’t be going to the Ducati Moto GP team.

The wording of the press release from Yamaha regarding the future of Ben Spies was as vague as it possibly could be. They “foresee” Spies remaining in Superbike for 2010, which translated means “We’ll wait and see what happens with Edwards and Toseland before making a decision”.

And then, what about the news that Haga might retire at the end of the year? I was very sceptical about this one considering that he hasn’t done what he set out to do – win a world championship. He is not too old and he’s still on the pace so why retire? The only thing I can think of is that all of the injuries he has sustained over the years are starting to hurt. But then, he hasn’t denied the rumours so perhaps he’s waiting to see if he wins the championship before deciding.

Should Haga retire, who would take his place at Ducati to ride along side the fiery Roman? With the Sterilgada teams future in doubt, there is an outside chance that it could be Shakey Burne.

Ducati are adamant that Stoner will be back on his Moto GP bike before the end of the year so we’ll have to take their word for it. That means that the top two Moto GP teams have finalised their rider line-up for next year. In fact, outside of the Tech 3 Yamaha team, it seems that most of the teams have rider contracts in place.

The World Superbike line-up on the other hand is still very much undecided and several of the riders I criticised for non-performance have come good. Fabrizio on the other hand who I believed was going to challenge for the championship has gone slightly off the boil and had a particularly bad day in Germany.

Corsa seems to have got the measure of the BMW and appears to be enjoying himself so I’ll withdraw my prediction that he’ll retire at the end of the year. Carlos Checa has at best been inconsistent this year but then he managed to ride out of his leathers at the Nurburgring. Ten Kate Honda would be silly to loose Johnny Rea but I’m still not certain that Checa will be staying.

With all of my predictions seeming to be wrong, perhaps I’ll wait until further into the silly season before making any more.

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I really think it would have livened up the championship if Lorenzo were on the Ducati.

Ben Spies

So that leaves an empty seat at Ducati or possibly two depending on the state of Stoners health next year. I am quite sure that Nicky Haydon won’t be riding a Ducati next year. What about Spies who has always had his eye on the Moto GP championship? Ducati do have a pile of cash on offer, more than enough to buy him out of any contractual agreement with Yamaha. That would leave an empty seat at Yamaha in WSBK, which James Toseland could be in the frame for. Then of course there’s Cal Crutchlow who has taken the Supersport championship by storm.

Sure there may be a seat going at Ten Kate but they would be foolish not to keep Johnny Rea and they have stated that they will only be running two bikes next year. Kiyonari has been a disappointment but he is backed by the Honda factory, unless he goes to another championship of course.

Paul Bird of Vent Axia will probably be looking for someone to ride the Kawasaki and I in common with most South Africans would like to see Sheridan Morias on that bike.

I guess that Nakano will not be at Aprilia next year and in the back of my mind I wonder if Corsa might retire given his age and that huge crash at Monza. You don’t lose the skill as you get older but it hurts more when you crash. That will leave two highly desirable factory rides up for grabs and if I was managing one of those teams I would be talking to Leon Haslam and Eugene Laverty.

Back to Moto GP, I predict that Colin Edwards will call it a day at the end of this season and James Toseland hasn’t performed which will leave two vacancies in that team. It’s more likely that those seats will be filled by up and coming 250 riders.

So there you have it, there will probably be an interesting game of musical chairs. As usual though, teams will choose riders based on their ability to attract sponsorship rather than on talent. Come back next week and let’s have a look at any new developments.

Going hard. Really hard. Hard enough to challenge!

Sheridan Morais is as well as competing in the National Superbike championship, also running a ZX6 Kawasaki in this year’s National Supersport championship. It seemed only natural that his father and tuning guru Ricky would prepare a bike for the World Supersport round at Kyalami.

There was a press conference on the Thursday before the race and Sheridan was sitting there as I walked in. He told me that he was on a Superbike for the Weekend. I asked him if he was riding his own bike, he said “No, I’m on the Vent Axia bike.” For those of you that don’t know, Vent Axia is the factory backed Kawasaki team for 2009. With Mokoto Tamada injured after a crash at Monza, Sheridan, with the help of Kawasaki South Africa, got the wild card ride on the Kawasaki. He graciously handed his 600 over to Robert Portman.

I asked Shez how the bike felt, he said, “I don’t know, I haven’t sat on it yet”.

Sheridan rode the bike in anger for the first time on Friday in free practice. He was 7^th on the timesheets with a 1:40.502, which is nothing short of amazing. I again asked him what the bike felt like compared to his, he said completely different but the most surprising was the brakes, “I thought my teeth were going to come out the first time I braked”. He adds; “I can’t get to grips with the electronics so I have switched everything off”. No electronics and he managed to be 7^th fastest with just his throttle hand, oh and track knowledge of course.

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