So now it’s the end of the racing season, and wow, what a season it was. Superbikes 2007 did not let us down for the crashes and battles and unpredictable weather, and the result was as good and exciting as any of us could have asked.

This season started off early, at the end of February, in Qatar. The weather was hot as usual, and the sand from the desert made conditions difficult when the wind blew it into the track.

Corser inevitably took Superpole, showing that he has taken well to the Yamaha and finishing crucially ahead of his new team mate, Nori Haga, who ended up fourth on the grid behind Toseland. New boy max Biaggi proved what he could do by qualifying second, despite it being his first round on a Superbike.
Biaggi certainly did not stop at Superpole to prove his potential, as through both races he fought Toseland for the top spot, beating him at the last minute in race one with Lanzi coming in third and then coming second in race two, making the top three Toseland, Biaggi and then Corser.

Karl Muggeridge and Michel Fabrizio collided in race one, but other than that there were no repeats of last year’s drama. Toseland and Biaggi went home sharing the championship lead.

Two weeks later and the whole shooting match arrived at Phillip Island, Australia. The weather stayed warm for the racing, but is usually windy at that time of year.
Qualifying proved disastrous as both Yukio Kagayama and Karl Muggeridge were hospitalised, with Muggeridge colliding with his team mate, Josh Brookes when the Alto-Evolution Honda went bang and ending up concussed and out of Superpole. Kagayama crashed without assistance and was taken to hospital with a suspected broken collar bone.

Superpole saw Corser, Toseland, Bayliss and Haga making up the front row of the grid, which led to the battles between Toseland and Bayliss for the top spot the next day in both races.

Bayliss managed to get past Toseland and win race one, but the young Englishman soon got his revenge and took away Bayliss’ chances of a double by winning race two. Max Biaggi finished third and fourth so Toseland found himself in the lead and with a respectable sixteen point lead just two meetings in.

Next was the first of the three rounds in the UK, Donington Park, where SBK was born twenty years ago. Luckily for the riders and visiting fans the weather did not repeat itself from the last time Superbikes visited this circuit and the snow stayed away.

Superpole saw both Troy Corser and Josh Brookes get caught by the wind going round Hollywood and sadly ending up in the gravel, leaving the front row of the grid as Bayliss, Haga, Laconi and Toseland.

Race one was the worst race, in my mind, of the season. Troy Bayliss was going very well, leading the race and being pushed hard by Toseland when he had a violent crash which resulted in him denting the gas tank on the bike. With his testicles. This, of course, hurt him a lot, and he ended up bursting one of them (as a woman, I can only start to imagine the pain) He also severed the little finger on his right hand. Toseland went on the win race one comfortably, followed by Corser and Biaggi.

Unluckily, in race two Toseland’s bike gave up whilst he was in the lead, and pulling clear. After beating the tank and screen in frustration, with surprising strength the twenty-six year old hurled the dead Fireblade against the barrier in rage, and with him out of the race his closest rival, Biaggi, was able to close the gap a little, coming in second after Haga with Corser third.

So after what should have been a triumphant weekend Toseland found his lead reduced to just five points over Biaggi.

Valencia started off interesting as the rain came hung around singing ‘should I stay or should I go...?’ This obviously made the qualifying and Superpole laps rather more exciting than usual. Especially for the riders.

The rain decided to hang around for Superpole, giving us our first wet one of the season. In case you still don’t know, wet Superpole is a bit like a qualifying session but more important…for fifty minutes each rider gets the opportunity to go around the track twelve times. The rider with the quickest time at the end of the session gets pole position. Simple enough, right? So Troy Bayliss managed to grab pole with local hero Xaus second.

The weather on race day stayed the same as the Saturday, giving the teams the problem of what tyre to put on the bike. By race one the track was dry enough for slicks, but there were definitely some patches in need of more grip. New for 2007, the Alto-Evolution Honda team finally had a chance to show what they were made of, as both Muggeridge and Brookes stormed their way into the top ten and although they did not stay in their highest positions, and Muggeridge eventually crashed out of the race, they still fought some pretty good battles. The most surprising result, however, was the top spot. Local favourite Ruben Xaus managed to take first place from a host of supposedly faster bikes and riders and keep it, leaving the final standings as Xaus, Haga and Bayliss. Toseland crossed the line in fifth place, but since Biaggi was eighth this did not really damage his championship.

However, race two saw the heat for the championship hot up once again, as Toseland and Biaggi battled for first despite an oil spill on track from the previous GSX-R cup round that left a long line of sand around the first corner. Muggeridge ran out of luck again this race as he was punted off into the gravel by Bussei. Toseland fought through to finish first, with Biaggi second and Haga third.

So now the championship standings were interesting, as Toseland was still in the lead but he now had Biaggi and Haga following his tail. This was looking promising for the rest of the season.

Assen next, where the British riders are always expected to do well. This year was no different, as the fluctuating weather did not affect Toseland’s lap times, and he destroyed the lap record and flew so fast through Superpole that no one could beat him. Lanzi came the closest, with Bayliss close behind.

Race one gave us a battle between Xaus, Toseland and Haga but after each of them had a turn at being in the lead Toseland eventually pulled away, leaving Xaus, Haga and Bayliss to scrabble between themselves for second, third and fourth. That left the results for race one as Toseland, Haga, Xaus and Bayliss.

However Bayliss was determined to show that he still had the championship flair, and in race two he stormed past Toseland and into the lead after a few laps, and in the lead he stayed through a few nail biting battles between current champion and the man looking most likely to lift the crown. Bayliss eventually took the chequered flag, with Toseland taking second just nine thousandths of a second behind and Biaggi coming in third.

This now left Toseland with a thirty-two point lead in the championship with one hundred and ninety-six points, having won a race at every round so far.

Soon the boys were at their first Italian round at Monza, where the editor and I had the huge dilemma of trying to find where an Earth we were (for more details and an explanation of the title for this round see my blog) but the weather held out beautifully and stayed warm, letting Haga ride as if his life depended on it to take pole position with Bayliss second. Toseland overcooked it on one of the corners and did well to stay on the bike, but the mistake left him starting fifth for the next day’s races.

Race one had surprises in store as for the first time Roby Rolfo joined his team mate in the running for the top spot, which lasted for a few laps but Nitro Nori soon butted in, overtaking Rolfo with ease and was soon exchanging paintwork with Toseland, running neck and neck into corners and swapping first place quite a few times. Eventually, though, Haga crossed the line first as Toseland cooked his tyres and dropped back to fourth, finishing behind a now fully recovered Bayliss and Biaggi.

Race two saw Toseland once again taking the lead with many battles between Rolfo, Biaggi, Bayliss, Corser, Haga and, surprisingly, Laconi. Eventually Haga broke free from the battling pack and went on to overtake Toseland and stick with first place to take the first double win of the season. Rolfo and Bayliss had an audible battle as they went round corners with the sound of fairings banging, but they luckily both stayed on and Bayliss prevailed to take third place.

This left the championship standings with James breaking into the over two hundred point marker at two hundred and twenty-nine points and Biaggi being overtaken by Haga, who had just three more points on one hundred and ninety-four.

The boys headed back to England next for Silverstone, where the traditional English weather returned with a vengeance and it poured buckets, which, as Muggeridge said, at least made their tyre choice easy!
Superpole was interesting, as Bayliss did a flying lap to get pole position and Toseland’s closest competitor, Haga, was rounding up second. Toseland himself got third on the grid with Lanzi finishing off the front row.

Race day was, erm, a little damp to say the least, and this led to an exciting race one, where Toseland really shone and truly showed what he was made of, but despite that he still was extremely unhappy and putting himself down about it. But now we’re getting ahead of ourselves… The first catastrophe of the race was Muggeridge managing a highside as he touched the kerb just a couple of corners in, and thankfully only knocking his team mate off the track instead of off the bike. There was an interesting battle between the two Yamahas for second place, as Bayliss took the lead. Corser managed to overtake his team mate and Toseland held onto third until lap three, when he lost the back tyre and the bike spat him off. This is where our British rider shone, as he ran to the bike, picked it up, re-started it and re-joined the race in eighteenth position with no coolant pipe and a big chunk missing out of the middle of the bike. He then rode on for the rest of the race with no coolant whatsoever in the bike. On lap thirteen Josh Brookes crashed the bike from sixth position, leaving both Alto-Evolution Hondas out of the race, but on the more optimistic side, Toseland had managed to drag himself up into a worthy eighth place by lap twenty-four, bringing the bike across the line just before it gave up and gathering those much needed points.

Soon after race one the rain came down so hard that the track become flooded, which meant that race two was cancelled, much to the dismay of most riders. Although most were privately relieved that at least they would not be riding in those conditions, publicly they were saying that they wanted to get out there and do it. Crazy men, all of them...

No rain at Misano, though. In fact the complete opposite as the fierce Adriatic sun beat down on the track, cooking the rubber off tyres and making many people in the media office feel giddy with the constant changes of temperature from the very hot outside and very air conditioned media centre.

Pole position was constantly shifting between riders, and Haga had it in the bag from Toseland until Corser came out and lived up to his “Mr Superpole” title, which Bayliss came close to beating but missed leaving the front row of the grid as Corser, Bayliss, Haga and Toseland.

Race one showed the Ten Kate team that there was a previously unknown problem with the Honda as Toseland ended up back in eighth and having to battle hard to fight back up to fourth. Meanwhile Haga and Bayliss battled for the top spot after a short battle between the two Yamahas of Corser and Haga for second place. Haga took to the front for a while before Bayliss made a fantastic overtake. Then Biaggi decided to join the top pack, overtaking Troy Corser and trying for a spectacular overtake on the inside of Haga, but instead knocking both Haga and himself off the bikes and into the gravel, thus moving Corser up into second and giving Kagayama his first podium of the season with Toseland coming in a lucky fourth.

Race two started with Bayliss once again taking the lead and Haga slotting him behind him trying to overtake on every opportunity he got, but none of his overtakes stuck and eventually he and Bayliss rode off in the distance taking away Corser’s chance of more than a third place finish on the podium. Toseland managed to overtake Biaggi and Xaus when Biaggi ran wide through a corner, but soon the problems with his bike were holding him back again and he ended up back behind Biaggi after a struggle to try and stick to fifth place. Soon Biaggi was ahead of his team mate, Kagayama and ahead of Corser and into third place, where he finished the race. This left the finishing positions as Bayliss, Haga and Biaggi – the second double win of the season taken by Bayliss.

This bad round obviously did some damage to Toseland’s championship efforts, but he hung onto first place with Bayliss moving up two places to second, twenty one points behind the Englishman on two hundred and thirty-nine points. Haga was third and Biaggi fourth.

The weather from Misano carried for the riders as the season carried on in Brno after a month’s break, making the tyre choices simple, once again. Race one showed that Toseland had put his previous bad round in Italy behind him as he came out tops after a four way battle for first with Biaggi, Kagayama and Haga, all of them swapping places numerous times. Bayliss was struggling on the Ducati, and his struggling was finished when Muggeridge got clobbered in the frenzy and dropped his bike, which slid on and knocked Bayliss out at the same time. Toseland luckily managed to keep first after some hassle from Biaggi, a battle that lasted right up to the finish line, making the finishing results for race one Toseland, Biaggi and then a second podium of the season for Kagayama.

Race two saw one of the main shocks for this season – a DFX Honda on the podium! Michel Fabrizio repeated his performance from last year and came out of nowhere to shadow the once again battling Italian and British riders Toseland and Biaggi. Bayliss only managed a sixth place finish and Haga stayed behind Fabrizio, but Toseland’s chances of a double were taken from him by Biaggi who got the better of the battle and crossed the finish line first.

This round was a good one for Toseland, and the fact that he finished behind Biaggi in the second race proved not to be a problem as he had a forty-three point lead over the Italian who retook second place overall from Haga and Bayliss.

August, and it was time for what is definitely regarded as the highlight of the season, Brands Hatch. Unusually for England, it did not rain! In fact, it stayed beautifully sunny the whole weekend and everybody stayed in high spirits. Superpole showed amazing results, as Haga, Toseland and Bayliss all did incredibly fast laps, all beating one another to the top spot. Bayliss was continually fastest in qualifying and carried this through to his superpole lap, despite a small wobble. This left him on pole position followed by Toseland, determined to impress his home crowd, and then Haga who just rides ridiculously fast whatever track you put him on. Kagayama finished the front row of the grid in fourth in what is probably the closest to a home race for the ex BSB rider.

Race one saw Bayliss take the lead from a suspiciously quick start, but that did not last for long as Toseland was on form and took over from there. Bayliss fought for a while but eventually Toseland pulled away, letting Haga start on Bayliss and win so that he could start pursuit of his rival for the championship title. Bayliss’ luck did not improve, as he ran wide and Corser managed to overtake him, and his suspected jump start must have preyed on his mind as he lost the front end on the way into Druid’s and crashed out of the race. Toseland stayed ahead with Haga starting to catch up, but a small mistake by the Japanese rider led to a massive slide and Haga ended up riding in the gravel and making his way back to the track, allowing Corser and Biaggi to take second and third place. This left the final standings as Toseland, Corser and Biaggi.

Race two gave the British public high hopes as after a while of Bayliss leading and Toseland following Haga into third, the young Englishman decided to take some action and as Haga overtook Bayliss he followed, soon overtaking Haga as well to once again take the lead. Biaggi was riding well and in with a good chance of another podium finish, but jumping the line at the start of the race meant that he had a penalty ride through the pits which demoted him to sixteenth place. More battles went on between Haga and Toseland and for a few laps Haga took the lead, making everybody groan in anguish and hope that Toseland would manage his first ever double. But Corser came to the rescue and started battling with the top two, allowing Toseland take the lead and and extend it over Haga who now had to deal with the issue of trying to keep second place, let alone pass Toseland for first. Soon a gap had formed between Haga and Toseland, and the young Englishman took his first ever double to try and prove that he had the talent for Moto GP and he that was determined to be taking the number one plate with him. Haga finished second, with Corser third ahead of Fabrizio.

James Toseland now had an incredible sixty-six point lead in the championship ahead of his closest rival Haga, who had once again passed Biaggi by three points.

After another month break the riders were back in Europe for the Lausitzring round. All the riders dislike this track incredibly, and their mood was reflected in the weather as it rained cats and dogs. There is a funny story in this round about my disaster with choice of footwear, but that is irrelevant!

This weather led to the second wet Superpole of the season which had interesting results, as Fonsi Nieto managed to get out onto the track thirty seconds before the rain started and therefore was nearly four seconds faster than everybody else, putting him on an unlikely pole position, with his team-mate Laconi second, Bayliss third and Corser fourth. It also gave us the most crash laden qualifying of the year, with everyone except Biaggi going down at least once on the treacherously slippery surface.

Race one saw the likely competitors for the title of first place moving backwards through the pack further towards the race as there were tyre problems with Bayliss and Toseland’s bikes. These problems meant that Bayliss went from the top of the pack to towards the bottom and Toseland’s chances of getting to a better place from the bad start he got were taken away, while both his main competitors for the title, Haga and Biaggi stayed up the top and managed to finish first and second. This round also saw Alto-Evolution Honda’s new signing, Yoann Tiberio, manage to score points in his first ever Superbikes race. But at the front, Haga crossed the line ahead of Biaggi and Corser after what was, to be honest, a pretty boring race.

Race two was equally boring uninspiring, with no battles until Haga caught up with Bayliss in the lead in lap ten with Toseland blocking Corser down in fourth and Biaggi sitting comfortably in third. For a while Haga took the lead but after a while Bayliss took it back and went on to win comfortably, followed by Haga and then Biaggi. Toseland’s recurring tyre problems, by the way, were eventually traced back to a cracked swingarm after a qualifying crash.

This left the championship a little closer, with Haga just forty one points shy of the lead and Biaggi a further twelve points behind him.

So everybody went back to Italy for the debut round at Vallelunga. An unseasonably wet Friday was followed by warm, dry and sunny weather for the rest of the weekend, again making it easy to decide on tyres. As it’s a new circuit on the calendar there were a fair few incidents in qualifying but the first real incident of note came in Superpole when Toseland fell off on his flying lap after destroying all the records up to that point. That little upset put the Englishman at the back of the second row. Corser thrashed everybody’s time until Bayliss came out and once again took pole position, leaving the front row of the grid for the next day as Bayliss, Corser, Xaus and Biaggi.

Race one was interesting as soon as it started as Toseland managed to get a fantastic start to slip into second place and then wobbled back into third, and was soon overtaken by Corser and then Haga and Biaggi simultaneously, causing a corner of three bikes racing neck and neck with luckily no catastrophes apart from Toseland ending up in fifth place. Fifth soon moved to fourth when Corser crashed, and soon Xaus came off the bike as well. Toseland did a very robust overtake on Haga at the start of the main straight and therefore found himself back up in third behind Biaggi and Bayliss. This did not last long, though, as Haga promptly overtook him again and stuck to third like chewing gum does to hair. In the meantime Biaggi was building a gap in the lead as Haga caught up with Bayliss and started to battle for second. Haga made a few mistakes and ran wide on a few corners, and by the end of the race Toseland had managed to catch up and take third place back. This left the finishing podium as Biaggi, Bayliss and Toseland.

Race two showed no interesting battles as Bayliss started in first and stayed there, and Toseland was overtaken into second by Haga who then pulled away forming a gap between himself and the young Brit. Biaggi soon had caught up with Corser and taken fourth place, and then he caught up with Toseland and took third. Toseland tried so hard to get third back that he ended up losing the back end and had to get up from a crash and restart the bike, rejoining in twelfth place from third. Positions then stayed the same until Laconi and Fabrizio both retired from the race, leaving Toseland in a brave eleventh place and the podium finishers as Bayliss, Biaggi and Haga.

This meant that the championship would be going down to the last race, and while Toseland was still leading it was only three hundred and ninety-six points to Biaggi’s three hundred and sixty-seven and Haga’s three hundred and sixty-three. Just twenty nine points.

The final round was Magny Cours where all fairytales came to an end. The weather was quite cold and foggy in the mornings giving a mysterious atmosphere to reflect everybody’s split minds as to whether Toseland would win this round or not.
Superpole was over pretty quickly as Toseland came out, did a ridiculously fast lap and no one could beat him. This showed great promise for the next days races and everybody was on tenterhooks hoping that he would get the championship title he really deserved.

So, race day…the final one of the season, and James Toseland’s final one of World Superbikes. Race one had everything, and everybody was in dismay when Lanzi’s massive highside on the first corner resulted in Toseland running off the track and into the biggest gravel trap anywhere. He stayed on and kept going, but he rejoined the race dead last with an awful lot of work to do for those precious places and points that he needed for his title. Thankfully sportsmanship is still around and Rolfo moved aside for Toseland to overtake and work on getting into ninth place and chase his rival Biaggi. Soon Toseland had also overtaken Laconi so he was in eighth place. Meanwhile Corser and Neukirchner were battling it out for second, but Bayliss had different ideas as he nudged Neukirchner out the way, had a battle with Corser that made the media office gasp and screech and eventually took second place, leaving the podium positions as Haga, Bayliss and Corser. Biaggi finished sixth, just one point ahead of Toseland and leaving the title fight as a straight slugging match between Toseland and Haga. The Englishman needed to finish eighth or better to take his second championship, while Haga simply needed to win or come second to still be in with a shot.

Race two had the most comical moment of the season in it as Roby Rolfo went to the wrong place in the grid after the warm up lap, would have to be the first time a rider tried to start lower down in the grid than he originally was! Everything got sorted out and race started, Haga once again taking the lead followed by Bayliss. Toseland was stuck down in fifth place and having many battles with many people, but he was trying just to stay ahead of seventh place and on the bike, as that was all he needed to do. So fans were not too bothered when Bayliss then overtook him into fifth place, leaving Toseland in sixth. Poor Corser got nudged around a bit more as Fonsi Nieto decided that he wanted to show what he was made of and shoved him out of the way to get into third place. This meant that the finishing positions were Haga, Biaggi and Nieto, showing a last round burst of talent that had been notably absent for the rest of the season.

Now, both of Toseland’s rivals were ahead of him in the race, in the top two places – but this luckily did not change anything as he grasped the championship by a nail biting two points and stepped onto the podium to receive his trophy as a very, very happy man. And at the bottom of that podium there were thousands of even happier screaming fans.

So, Toseland has now moved up to GP, and as he became extremely drunk that night and listened to the choruses of ‘we are the champions’ everybody in Britain went to sleep with a smile on their face, because we now knew that we may not have won the football and we weren’t going to win the rugby or the cricket and Lewis Hamilton was not going to win formula one…but at least we were good at motorbike racing. The next week Toseland stepped into Butlins and on stage with his band CRASH, and as he sang Journey’s ‘Don’t Stop Believing’ we all knew how right that song was.

So what an amazing season, with amazing results. Until next time, don’t get too bored without bike racing!

LB