Spies and Haga share wins

Added on Monday, March 2nd, 2009 by Carole Nash Editor | No Comments

Ben Spies marked his debut in World Superbikes with a win as he and new Ducati rider Noriyuki Haga took the chequered flags at Phillip Island.

Spies, making his first competitive appearance on the Yamaha R1 after dominating the AMA Championship for the past three years, secured the first ever Superpole of the new season on Saturday before taking victory in race two in Australia.

In a day full of closely-fought events on the high-speed Phillip Island circuit, a fall from the Yamaha rider at turn two meant that Haga, the man that he replaced at Yamaha, could take the lead early.

The Japanese rider then held-off the challenge of Suzuki duo Max Neukirchner and Yukio Kagayama to take the first chequered flag of the season, with Spies finishing outside of the points in 16^th.

Race two however proved to be far more positive for Spies and resulted in a Brit on the podium as Leon Haslam secured a third place finish on his debut with the privateer Stiggy Honda.

The race was dominated by the battle between the R1 and Ducati 1098, with Haga holding an early lead but struggling to pull away from the Yamaha man. Spies then punished Haga at the end of the home straight and held his nerve to finish 1.286 ahead.

Haslam held-off the challenge of Regis Laconi and Michel Fabrizio on the Ducatis and Neukirchner to secure the final podium spot, 4.213 seconds behind Spies.

After the race, Spies revealed his delight at getting his WSB career off to a win.

“The first race was pretty rubbish for me, but I knew I could come back in race two and fight it out,” he said.

“Unfortunately the incident with Biaggi and Haslam left me no option and forced me off, a double blow to be forced off again shortly after with the Xaus incident! I almost made it into the points and had the pace to do it. Congratulations to Nori for that one.

“The second race was really tough, I had a couple of attempts to break the lead, and watched Nori as much as possible to see where the opportunities were, we were both keeping the pace really high. I tried to stay as close as possible to him and waited for his grip levels to come down.

“With four laps to go I felt it was the right moment so I put my head down and charged and just kept going!”

World Superbikes 2009: Round 1, Race 1:

Pos	Rider	Nat	Team	Time
1	N. Haga	JAP	Xerox Ducati	34:22.631
2	M. Neukirchner	GER	Alstare Suzuki	+0.032
3	Y. Kagayama	JAP	Alstare Suzuki	+5.347
4	M. Fabrizio	ITA	Xerox Ducati	+6.587
5	J. Rea	GBR	Ten Kate Honda	+8.491
6	L. Haslam	GBR	Stiggy Honda	+8.523
7	R. Laconi	FRA	DFX Ducati	+8.766
8	T. Corser	AUS	BMW Team Alpha	+11.589
9	J. Smrz	CZE	Guandalini Ducati	+11.721
10	T.Sykes	GBR	Yamaha	+11.761
14	T. Hill	GBR	Ten Kate Honda	+27.416
RET	S. Byrne	GBR	Sterilgarda Ducati

World Superbikes 2009: Round 1, Race 2:

Pos	Rider	Nat	Team	Time
1	B. Spies	USA	Yamaha	34.20.457
2	N. Haga	JAP	Xerox Ducati	+1.286
3	L. Haslam	GBR	Stiggy Honda	+4.213
4	R. Laconi	FRA	DFX Ducati	+4.490
5	M. Fabrizio	ITA	Xerox Ducati	+6.045
6	M. Neukirchner	GER	Alstare Suzuki	+9.947
7	J. Smrz	CZE	Guandalini Ducati	+10.174
8	Y. Kagayama	JAP	Alstare Suzuki	+12.100
9	J. Rea	GBR	Ten Kate Honda	+12.742
10	T.Sykes	GBR	Yamaha	+20.061
13	T. Hill	GBR	Ten Kate Honda	27.162
RET	S. Byrne	GBR	Sterilgarda Ducati

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Spies and Haga share wins

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Carole Nash