With the Yamaha Superbike Challenge coming up this Saturday and Sunday in Fontana, California, and including a double-header (superbike races on both Saturday and Sunday), Yoshimura Suzuki’s defending champion Mat Mladin is in trouble. He is a full 38 points behind Honda’s Nicky Hayden after failing to start the Daytona 200 a few weeks ago, and he is still suffering from the effects of an elbow injury resulting from a pre-race crash at Daytona.
According to statements made by Mladin during a conference call with several moto journalists earlier this week, his elbow is still not 100% and, Mladin has also indicated previously, he has muscle strength problems in the same arm. Having ridden the same track the superbike racers will circulate on Saturday and Sunday (albeit, at a fraction of their speed), I can attest to the need for arm strength. Several chicanes require rapid, high-speed direction changes, and hard braking for relatively tight turns at the end of high-speed sections abound on this track. Mladin is a very tough customer, but he will definitely be at a significant disadvantage on the California Speedway track this weekend.
