01/07/2010
Team Suzuki Press Office - July 1.
Phil Tainton is Team Manager for Suzuki Australia's Championship-winning Superbike team.
"After taking delivery of the all new GSX-R1000K9 mid 2009 and winning the Australian Superbike Championship last year, Team Suzuki was both excited and quietly confident of a good start to the 2010 Championship.
"A difficult first round at Phillip Island, due to a broken external gear linkage on Josh Waters' bike, put us on the back foot, but since that moment we have turned the season around. After a dominating round at Darwin with pole position and two wins and another very successful round at Queensland Raceway, Josh is now back within 9.5 points of the Championship lead.
"Shawn Giles turned 40 at the third round at Queensland Raceway which also marked his 11th year with Team Suzuki and three Australian Championships over a wide and ever developing model range of GSX-Rs (from the early 750cc to the current 1000cc electronic fuel-injected models). Shawn is currently fourth in the Championship and with some new Ohlins suspension settings we had for Queensland, he is feeling much more comfortable on the bike.
"Troy Herfoss has been showing his opposition just how good the GSX-R600 is in the always hotly contested Supersport 600 category. Troy is in only his second year with Team Suzuki and, more importantly, in only his second year of road racing. After some successful years of supermoto racing in America, Troy got the bug for road racing and is currently leading the Australian Supersport Championship by 19 points.
"You may have read that Josh was invited to an AMA test at Barber Raceway in Alabama in the States, courtesy of Suzuki Australia, American Suzuki and Yoshimura R&D. The boys at Yoshimura were all very friendly and extremely helpful and did a great job in building Josh a bike to the same spec as Tommy and Blake's bikes. Josh ended the second day (of the two-day test) fourth fastest, which I was very happy with. He had not been to the circuit before and it's a circuit that is very demanding on the front end, and all second and third gears only, so fourth fastest was a great result.
"Unfortunately Blake Young suffered an injury at the Barber test, and most importantly, we wish Blake a speedy recovery. Josh has been asked to fill in at round six (Mid-Ohio) and seven (Laguna Seca). These races will be a big challenge for Josh as the circuits are quite hard but I know he is up to the challenge.
"In conclusion I think Suzuki have given us a great bike in the GSX-R1000L0 and, apart from the lady luck element in racing, this model GSX-R is by far the best yet and is a Championship-winning machine."