This season is showing all the signs of becoming Noryuki Haga's year. The veteran and ever popular and spectacular rider is enjoying his best start to a season ever, picking up anything left by rookie Ben Spies as well as winning every time the kid screws the pooch, which happens often.

Haga replaced 2008 champion Troy Bayliss aboard the unbeatable 1198R Ducati, which dominated WSB by a long shot last year. Ben Spies is consistently quicker than Haga and everyone else in SuperPole, with five-out-of-five so far this year, but he does not always finish, while Haga works his way back up to second and inherits victories if Spies has a problem, enough to lead the championship after five of fourteen events, with an already 200 to 146 points lead over Spies. Unless Spies changes from a win-win-win approach to a championship-win approach, it looks like game-set-match for Haga come the end of the season, barring injury of course.

Ben Spies is on a different mission, after failing to secure a decent MotoGP ride, effectively getting dropped by Suzuki after winning three AMA Superbike Championship for them. Me thinks the boy is more than a little frustrated and out to show the world he belongs in the top rung of the sport. In fact, going to Suzuki for MotoGP would have been a mistake, as the company appears to be not really out to win, so his image would have suffered. Just ask ex Suzuki rider John Hopkins or current rider Chris Vermeulen about it!

So Spies is aboard the new Yamaha R1 in SBK, and setting the world on fire at tracks he has never seen. He will likely continue to try to make everyone else look slow, even if it means the odd crash. Next year, he will know the tracks and still be quick without having to over-ride so much. As for MotoGP, that class is dominated by shrimp-sized riders these days, and I believe a stockier and taller Spies will be penalised on these high-revving, all-power and no-torque tiny racers.

Rather than commit to MotoGP at all costs, Spies could remain in Superbike and establish himself as a well paid legend there. Mind you, a good MotoGP season or two would certainly raise his game, and make him almost invincible in SBK, as long as he was smart enough to select the right team and manufacturer, and attract the right people around him, like Mat Mladin, Kenny Roberts Sr, "King Karl" Fogarty, Mick Doohan, and Schumi in F1 did before him in their respective classes.

In my opinion, Suzuki messed up big time in letting Spies go elsewhere, a case of European and Japanese Suzuki management looking down at three AMA championships in what they consider a second tier series, and preferring a German (9th in points this year) and a Japanese rider (13th) for international representation. Suzuki is currently 4th in the manufacturer chase, ahead of Kawasaki and two newcomers to SBK, Aprilia and BMW. We may have found something more obscure and complex than Wagnerian opera: Japanese manufacturer goals and politics!

We must mention another rider who may create waves this year, Michel Fabrizio, the second Ducati factory rider. He is quick and, like Spies, out to make his bones and go on to MotoGP. And with 125 points so far, he is third in the championship and still capable of catching the two flyers ahead of him.

On a different note, it may be too late, but I would just love to see Mat Mladin on a two-year program in WSB with Suzuki, as I think he would woop ass the second year, much like 2008 Champion Troy Bayliss did last year at age 39. Those Euro-snobs deserve the spanking!


Photo Credit : Yamaha