Hayden Looks to Come Full Circle at Raceway

A 16-year-old Nicky Hayden won his first professional motorcycle race at Laguna Seca in 1998, a 750cc supersport, part of the American Motorcyclist Assn. series.

Seven years later, the kid from Owensboro, Ky., won his first pole in a MotoGP, the highest level of two-wheel racing, when he averaged 98.466 mph Saturday, riding a Repsol Honda around a course called “too dangerous” by world champion Valentino Rossi and other foreign riders in the U.S. Grand Prix.

All that remains to be filled on his racing resume is a MotoGP win, and that could come today in a 32-lap chase around Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca’s 2.238 miles with its 11 turns.

“I can’t wait to show what I can do in front of all my home fans, seeing all those American flags waving,” the soft-spoken Hayden said in his Kentucky drawl. “I’ve seen all the flags waving for European riders in their country and know how it makes them feel, so I know how great it will be for me.”

While controversy raged in the Grand Prix garages over the difficulty of riding Laguna Seca and how different it is from European tracks, Hayden was fastest in Friday practice and after the first 10 minutes of Saturday’s hourlong qualifying, he was the early leader and never lost his advantage.

Rossi will start alongside Hayden on the three-cycle front row after falling more than 0.3 of a second shy of the pole in his final trip around the track. Brazilian Alex Barros, at 34 the oldest rider in the race and the only one who rode in the last world championship race here in 1994, was third fastest.

“It’s always difficult to win races in MotoGP, but this time it’s even worse because there are more riders than usual with a chance of victory,” Rossi said. “Hayden is very fast, also [Troy] Bayliss and Colin [Edwards]. The Americans have an extra motivation, but we all want to win and that is what I am here for.”

Bayliss, an Australian who has ridden in the U.S. for the last three years, will start fourth and Edwards, Rossi’s teammate from Conroe, Texas, is fifth. Another American, John Hopkins of Ramona, Calif., will fill out the second row.

Rossi has won six of the seven races this year, including the last five in a row. He has won the last four world championships, one in the obsolete two-stroke 500cc class and three in MotoGP, two with Honda and one with the Yamaha four-stroke he will ride today.

Hayden, who won the 2002 AMA superbike title before moving to Grand Prix bikes, won the Laguna Seca round of the 2000 superbike season.

“Laguna is about how I remember it, though I haven’t been here for three years,” Hayden said. “It does seem a little smaller for a GP bike though, and the straight that I remembered that seemed real long seems a little shorter now.”

The largest crowd in Laguna Seca’s 48-year history -- a sold-out 54,900 tickets and an additional 8,000 that included course workers, media, team personnel, concessionaires and officials -- watched the hour of qualifying, and another similar crowd will be on hand for today’s sold-out race.

Track officials said the most people for an event in the past was between 50,000 and 60,000 for Pope John Paul in 1987. There were no tickets, however, so there was no official figure known.

Rossi, who said Friday that “there are some places where [the track] is very, very dangerous,” and that “If we don’t make some changes to this track for the future we might not be able to race here again,” backed down a bit Saturday.

“Now it’s coming better, the track has more grip today,” he said. “The track feels less difficult now.”

His complaints focused on dangerous run-off areas around several turns and a bumpy asphalt surface.

Max Biaggi, Hayden’s Italian teammate who qualified seventh, said that “Laguna Seca must be accepted for what it is. We are in the USA and we cannot pretend it’s a European track. The circuit is surely exciting, with its ups and downs and several blind points, where you don’t see where you are putting your wheels.”

Eric Bostrom, of Las Vegas, led all 28 laps on his Ducati to win the AMA superbike championship. Suzukis ridden by Mat Mladin, Aaron Yates and Ben Spies, finished second, third and fourth.