Copyright 2003, Roadracing World Publishing, Inc.

By David Swarts

Prieto Racing’s Michael Barnes and Bettencourt Racing’s Jeff Wood won the CCS GTO and GTU solo endurance races, respectively, in extremely wet conditions Friday at Daytona International Speedway.

Kosco Harley-Davidson/Buell’s Eric Wood, riding a Firebolt XB9R, got the jump on the 33-bike GTO field only to be passed by Team Embry’s Brian Stokes going into the International Horseshoe on the first lap. Stokes immediately pulled out a three-second lead on his GSX-R750. Wood, meanwhile, was relegated to fifth when GSX-R1000-mounted Geoff May and Michael Barnes and GSX-R600-mounted Darren Luck motored by Eric Wood on the banking.

May passed both Luck and Barnes on the brakes into the chicane to take second on lap two and took the lead from his teammate Stokes on the east banking two laps later. Barnes took the lead for the first time on lap four as the race turned into a two-way battle between Barnes and May.

Turning laps as fast as 2:12, May re-passed Barnes and was leading when May crashed at the exit of the new chicane.

“He highsided right in front of me,” said Barnes. “I almost crashed there myself. I thought the bike was gone (makes hand gestures of losing the rear end of a motorcycle). I figured I would hold onto the bars another second in case it came back, and it did. I tell you, it’s just insane to ride a 1000 around here in these conditions. I was hung out sideways all the way through the tri-oval.”

May crashed at high speed and slid into the inflatable air barriers placed in front of the outside speedway wall. “I was going about 25 mph when I hit it. I couldn’t stand up and run, I was going that fast. I was definitely going fast enough where I could’ve broken something. It made a difference. It was soft. Bikes were still coming and getting out of shape over the paint lines down there, so I got behind the Airfence for protection.” May said he broke his femur when he crashed in the Daytona chicane and hit an unprotected wall a few years ago.

Luck crashed out of third place trying to avoid May’s crashed Suzuki, which was lying in the middle of the track.

With bikes down and on the track, officials stopped the race, and scoring was reverted to the last lap completed. Barnes, who plans to race the entire AMA Superbike series, was credited with the win over Brian Stokes and Eric Wood. May was placed 16th with Luck 17th, the last riders on the lead lap; Luck appealed the decision and officials revised the results Saturday morning by placing Luck second, Stokes third and Wood fourth.

Rain continued to fall for the GTU race, and rain-fan Jeff Wood jumped out to a big early lead on his Suzuki GSX-R600. Riding his recently-crashed GSX-R600, Luck came from the sixth row of the grid to within two seconds of Jeff Wood through the middle of the 30-minute race. Jeff Wood lowered his lap times into the low-2:10s, but Luck made up ground through traffic in the second half of the soggy battle.

Luck closed to within a few bikelengths of Jeff Wood as the two riders splashed under the white flag. Luck continued to close the gap until the back straight. “I made a mistake,” said Luck. “I pulled beside him and showed him that I was there. Then he went deeper into the chicane than I did and beat me. Plus I was being a little cautious at the exit of the chicane after my crash.”

Jeff Wood held on for the win, and told reporters he was also being cautious. “I crashed in the dogleg this morning and slid so far I almost came back across the exit of the west horseshoe. I must have slid 1000 feet. So I still had to get that out of my head. I changed my line and tip-toed through there (dogleg). Plus my mechanic said he was catching on the banking with motor, but that’s okay because that was my B-bike.”

The race for third involved Jeff Binford, Scott Cunningham and young gun Jason Perez. Riding at Daytona and on rain tires for the first time, Perez held third until getting passed by Binford late in the race. Binford finished third ahead of Perez and Cunningham. Andrew Nelson took sixth on a Honda CBR600RR equipped with stock suspension, with Scott Greenwood seventh, Hooters Suzuki’s Michael Himmelsbach eighth, Chris Peris ninth and Brad Graham 10th.

Amateur GTO:
1. Brian Shaw, Suzuki GSX-R750
2. Bill Card, Yamaha YZF-R6
3. David Loikits, Suzuki GSX-R1000
4. Henry Chin, Suzuki GSX-R1000
5. Donny Kelley, Honda CBR600
6. Jay Scott Quick, Suzuki GSX-R750

Expert GT Lights:
1. Kyle Ray, Suzuki SV650
2. Alex Ferreira, Suzuki SV650
3. Darren Danilowicz, Suzuki SV650
4. Matthew Eaton, Suzuki SV650
5. Brian McClain, Suzuki SV650
6. Mark Hamilton, Suzuki SV650

Expert GTO:
1. Michael Barnes, Suzuki GSX-R1000
2. Darren Luck, Suzuki GSX-R600;
3. Brian Stokes, Suzuki GSX-R750
4. Eric Wood, Buell XB9R
5. John McGarity, Suzuki GSX-R1000
6. Jeffery Smalls, Suzuki GSX-R750

Amateur GTU:
1. William Meyers, II, Kawasaki ZX-6R
2. Darren Mulvaney, Suzuki GSX-R600
3. Donny Kelley, Honda CBR600
4. Rey De La Sierra, Honda CBR600
5. Stuart Vernon, Yamaha YZF-R6
6. Dafan Zhang, Yamaha YZF-R6

Expert GTU:
1. Jeff Wood, Suzuki GSX-R600
2. Darren Luck, Suzuki GSX-R600
3. Jeff Binford, Yamaha YZF-R6
4. Jason Perez, Suzuki GSX-R600
5. Scott Cunningham, Yamaha YZF-R6
6. Andrew Nelson, Honda CBR600RR

GP Singles:
1. Brian Kcraget, Honda RS125
2. Steve Wenner, Honda RS125
3. Reet Das, Honda RS125
4. Scott Jackson, Honda RS125
5. Samantha Cotter, Honda RS125
6. Scott Brooks, Honda RS125

Expert Lightweight Supersport:
1. John Linder, Suzuki SV650
2. Alex Ferreira, Suzuki SV650
3. Darren Danilowicz, Suzuki SV650
4. Danny Tackett, Suzuki SV650
5. Brian McClain, Suzuki SV650
6. Kevin Kincaid, Suzuki SV650

Amateur Lightweight Supersport:
1. Russ Bolle, Suzuki SV650
2. Thomas Williams, Suzuki SV650
3. Benny Dafonte, Suzuki SV650
4. Bill Davenport, Suzuki SV650
5. Lance Crawford, Suzuki SV650
6. Robert Corvo, Suzuki SV650

Expert Middleweight Sportsman:
1. Charles Burnett, Honda 650
2. Robert Cole, Ducati 750
3. Randy Nusbaum, H-D 1200
4. Robert Lee, Kawasaki 500
5. Steve Pennington, H-D 1200
6. Kevin Weir, MuZ 686

Amateur Middleweight Sportsman:
1. Robert Greenwald, Aprilia RS250
2. Dominic Chiuchiarelli, Aprilia RS250
3. Angel Gomez, Aprilia RS250
4. Ken Davis, Honda 250

Expert Lightweight Sportsman:
1. David Weaver, MuZ 660
2. Robert Lee, Kawasaki 500
3. Kevin Weir, MuZ 660
4. Ken Murphy, Yamaha 400
5. Paul Conley, MuZ 720
6. Charles Easterling, Yamaha 350

Amateur Lightweight Sportsman:
1. Dave Gabert, Honda 400
2. Thomas Deloriea, Kawasaki 500
3. David Clark, Yamaha 400
4. Angel Gomez, Aprilia RS250

Amateur Middleweight Supersport:
1. William Meyers, II, Kawasaki ZX-6R
2. Rey De La Sierra, Honda 600
3. Dafan Zhang, Yamaha YZF-R6
4. Hector Jimenez, Honda CBR600
5. Michael Krakar, Yamaha YZF-R6
6. Stuart Vernon, Yamaha YZF-R6

Amateur GT Lights:
1. Jesse Nunn, Suzuki SV650
2. Michael Mills, Suzuki SV650
3. Chris Lillingston-Price, Ducati Supermono
4. Russ Bolle, Suzuki SV650
5. Benny Dafonte, Suzuki SV650
6. Dave Ellis Maney, Ducati 900