Honda’s Nicky Hayden virtually dominated his last year of AMA Superbike competition, taking the title, before moving on to the top Honda MotoGP team as the teammate of multi-time World champion Valentino Rossi. Now well into his rookie year on the MotoGP circuit, Hayden is slowly, but surely, improving and looking more comfortable.
Last weekend at the German GP, Nicky scored his best finish yet, a fifth place (nearly fourth place — he was passed on the last lap by Ducati’s Loris Capirossi). This occurred on a track Hayden had never seen before . . . making it doubly impressive!
At 22 years old, Nicky has an awfully bright future in MotoGP. He is already showing great maturity by avoiding many of the mistakes common to rookies, such as crashing too much. Nicky has been good about keeping the rubber side down this year (although he has crashed a few times), and is approaching this learning year cautiously, and intelligently. His speed is just starting to show, and he could be in the title hunt in a year or two.
As we have said many times before, Nicky Hayden is an awesome talent. It is only a matter of time, and international experience, before he battles for the top spot. Interestingly, Honda has him aboard an RC51 to contest the Suzuka 8 Hour competition next week.
