Henny Ray Abrams | May 31, 2008
TOOELE, UTAH, MAY 31: Hannspree Ten Kate Honda’s Carlos Checa sped to his first ever Superpole title in advance of Sunday’s World Superbike double-header with the fastest ever lap by a motorcycle on the Perimeter Course at Miller Motorsports Park in Tooele, Utah. Starting fourth from last, after finishing fourth in final qualifying, the Spaniard went to the top and set a very high bar for the final three to top. He lapped the 3.06-mile track in 1:48.193 minutes at an average speed of 101.454 mph. That bettered the previous mark of 1:49.167 set by Ben Spies in 2006. Kawasaki PSG-1 Corse’s Regis Laconi had the first crack at the mark and missed the target by over a second; he would drop to fifth, then seventh by the end. Ducati Xerox’s Troy Bayliss also came up short, by less than .4 secs., leaving it up to fast qualifier Troy Corser of the Yamaha Motor Italia team. Corser couldn’t match the time of Bayliss or Checa and fell to fifth fastest. That meant the front row would be Checa, Team Alstare Suzuki’s Max Neukirchner, Bayliss, and his teammate Michel Fabrizio. Neukirchner went from sixth in qualifying to second on the grid. Fabrizio rose from eighth to fourth. Then Corser and Sterilgarda Go Eleven’s Ruben Xaus leads off row two from Laconi and Yukio Kagayama (Suzuki Alstare). Sterilgarda Go Eleven’s Max Biaggi was ninth, with Nori Haga a valiant tenth. Haga rode with a right collarbone that was broken in two places. The Japanese rider had crashed in morning qualifying and was originally thought to be unfit to ride in either the afternoon practice or Superpole. But after a visit to a local hospital, he made the decision to ride, and he rode well. The Yamaha Motor Italia rider jumped from 16th in qualifying to 10th place. Superpole: 1. Carlos Checa (Honda) 1:48.193 2. Max Neukirchner (Suzuki) 1:48.504 3. Troy Bayliss (Ducati) 1;48.604 4. Michel Fabrizio (Ducati) 1:48.800 5. Troy Corser (Yamaha) 1:48.975 6. Ruben Xaus (Ducati) 1:49.181 7. Regis Laconi (Kawasaki) 1:49.206 8. Yukio Kagayama (Suzuki) 1:49.394 9. Max Biaggi (Ducati) 1:49.479 10. Nori Haga (Yamaha) 1:49.735
Henny Ray Abrams | Contributing Editor
Abrams is the longest-serving contributor at Cycle News. Over the course of his 35-some years of writing and shooting photos, he’s covered events from MotoGP to the Motocross World Championship - and everything in between.
