By Dan Moakes
August 18 2004

A belated welcome to the e-Newsletter for the Motorcycle Racing Online website at SportNetwork. This weekly e-mail will allow you to check up on the latest stories at the site, as well as some occasional extras that may or may not be available there. This first official mailout comes at the end of the summer racing break. The British Superbike series resumed last weekend at the new venue of Croft, in North Yorkshire, and this weekend sees the latest MotoGP from the Czech Republic. The BSB races are to be televised tonight (the 18th of August), so look out for race reports in the next few days.

The MotoGP racers went into the August vacation following Valentino Rossi’s fifth win for Yamaha, at the British Grand Prix. Honda riders Colin Edwards and Sete Gibernau completed the podium, but the Spaniard’s two previous crashes mean that he is now 22 points down on Rossi. Max Biaggi’s poor showing in the Donington race means he is level with Gibernau in second position.

The Honda-Yamaha duel should resume at Brno, which is a track where Biaggi has seven previous victories, in the 250cc, 500cc and MotoGP classes. Rossi has four successful rides at the circuit under his belt, dating back to the 1996 125cc event. So far, his Yamaha team-mates haven’t quite offered Valentino the consistent back-up he might appreciate, whereas Honda have had all six of their riders on the podium this year. The Ducatis seem to be next in the pecking order.

For those who haven’t followed the British Superbikes, here is a quick update. After Shane ‘Shakey’ Byrne’s domination in 2003 on the MonsterMob Ducati, there were high hopes for his successor, Sean Emmett. Meanwhile, 2003 runner-up John Reynolds, on the Rizla Suzuki, was expected to be the biggest threat to Ducati. In fact, Emmett and the team have found the new 999 machine tricky to set up, especially as there is no World Superbike data for the Dunlop tyres prevalent in the UK. Sean has had a couple of wins, but hasn’t been consistently competitive to date.

This has left the way clear for Reynolds, and team-mate Yukio Kagayama, to take advantage. JR has been the man to beat so far, thanks to two years of development with the GSX-R1000. The closest challenger to Reynolds has turned out to be Michael Rutter, on the new HRC-supported Honda CBR1000RR FireBlade. The Honda runs on Michelin tyres, and there is no data from last season as a result - especially as Honda Racing fielded the SP-2 last year, for completely different riders. Ryuichi Kiyonari has had some good days on the second ’Blade after moving in from MotoGP.

Kawasaki’s representatives have been the Hawk team, with Glen Richards and Scott Smart, and John McGuinness as substitute for Richards due to injury. The ZX-10R bikes are new to the series for 2004, and have had to be converted from road going spec. But development has gone well, and Smart has ridden well enough to beat all comers a couple of times. And that leaves Yamaha, with the R1 in the hands of the Virgin Mobile team. Team leader Steve Plater suffered injuries early on, leaving the bike in the hands of youngsters Gary Mason and Tommy Hill. Both have had their good days, but the breakthrough came when James Haydon returned to the series as Plater’s substitute. His progress has been positive, culminating with a win at Knockhill.

So, World Superbikes may be a Ducati dominated series, with recent intervention by Honda, but the British championship, without single tyre manufacturer rules, has seen all five kinds of bike reach the top...