With the recent announcement by AMA Pro Racing of new Superbike rules for the 2003 series, MD was intrigued by the options facing manufacturers without a 1000cc v-twin at their disposal. Basically, an over-bore 750 (not more than 800cc) could take on the big v-twins or, alternatively, a lightly modified 1000cc machine (such as Suzuki’s GSX-R1000, for instance). Yoshimura Suzuki has both options available to it for the 2003 series, so we contacted team manager Don Sakakura and asked him to sit down for an interview. We think you will find Don’s comments interesting. We will run the interview in parts. Here is part one.
MD: You guys have obviously had more than your share of superbike success, with Mat Mladin, particularly, until last year. This last year I think highlighted the fact that the 750cc four cylinder bikes are kind of maxed out as far as their ability to be competitive with the 1000cc v-twins. I don’t know if you’d have any comments on that?
DS: Yeah, those are pretty much our thoughts. Obviously, the good majority of the race tracks that we run at now, acceleration and top speed are very important, and, you know, the 250cc difference in engine displacement now — I just feel that we are unable to make up that difference. In the past, I think that we focused more on suspension and chassis settings and, you know, at particular tracks we did fairly well with it. For the most part now, it’s just getting very, very difficult to compete.
MD: I think everybody agrees it was time for the AMA and for World Superbike to adjust the rules to make things a little more even, and we recently received new rules from the AMA regarding 2003. The AMA didn’t give teams much time to react to those new rules before the new year.
DS: Yeah, it’s unfortunate. The first week of August was our final event at Virginia, and the last couple of months we’ve been on edge waiting for the announcement from the AMA so we could go ahead and plan, and at least get in some test machines for this upcoming Daytona test, our largest test of the year in anticipation of the new year for the 200 weekend. The announcement a couple of weeks ago has just got us all scrambling now just to try to prepare a machine. Again, with the new 1000 that we were planning on running for next year, it’s just . . . there’s a lot involved there. Obviously, with geometry, suspension settings,` as well as engine spec, it’s going to be a whole new machine for us to work with.
MD: You’re referring to the Dunlop tests that are coming up? When are those tests exactly?
DS: This year it’s scheduled for December 8, 9 and 10. . . . it is a three day test which all of the Dunlop supported teams will attend.
MD: At this point are you planning to show up at the test with both a 1000cc machine and a big-bore 750?
DS: We’ve kind of ruled the big-bore 750 option out. It was something that I was initially pushing for, but the AMA has made the announcement that the minimum weight of the bikes will increase to 370 pounds, so our feeling is it really doesn’t make a lot of sense to pursue that 800cc option.
MD: So Yoshimura has already made a decision to go with a 1000cc bike for both Aaron [Yates] and Mat [Mladin] for 2003?
DS: That’s correct.
MD: You mentioned the minimum weight being bumped up from 355 to 370 pounds. I imagine you guys were already adding ballast to the 750 last year. Is that right?
DS: That’s correct. We were adding approximately seven to eight pounds on the machines just to make that minimum 355 requirement.
MD: If the weight had stayed at 355, would you have taken a closer look at the 800cc bike as an option?
DS: That was the intent initially, but when we saw the minimum weight was bumped up, we just didn’t feel it was worth the time and effort to pursue that option.
MD: Focusing on the Suzuki GSX-R1000, the production bike has been redesigned for 2003. It includes some chassis changes, such as the adjustable swingarm pivot, that were aimed directly at superbike racing. Does that chassis seem to present a good starting point for you guys as far as building a race bike?
DS: I believe it does, and it offers, like you said, the adjustability of the swingarm position, which is an important factor that we use for race track tuning. The basic chassis design — unfortunately, I don’t really have a lot of information on that right now. I know they’re currently scheduled for a late December production date so, like I said, it’s going to be a scramble to prepare a bike for the Daytona test, but that will really be our first look at the new race machine.
MD: The engine of the production bike has some minor tweaks for 2003, but I would imagine that you can already dig into the current motor and start trying to figure out what you’re going to do for 2003, motor-wise.
DS: Yes, Yoshimura Japan, our parent company, has been running the GSX-R1000 as a Formula X platform in Japan. So there’s a lot of information that is available — suspension, chassis geometry settings, etc., as well as engine spec. They’ve been very helpful with just the initial advice as far as preparing these initial Daytona test machines.
