Can Ducati Win Daytona Again?
Ducati has their best chance in years of winning the coveted Daytona 200 race this weekend. If they are successful it would be a first 200 victory but not the first time a Ducati has won at the famous tri-oval circuit. 34 years ago a magazine editor took a private Ducati 750SS tuned by a colleague and won the second ever AMA Superbike race at Daytona.
Although the event is a far cry from its prominence in its heyday in terms of machinery (originally the race featured Formula 1 Grand Prix machines then Superbikes before the current Daytona Sportbike class), the class of the field (GP World Champions used to run the race like Eddie Lawson, Freddie Spencer, Wayne Rainey, Kevin Schwantz and Kenny Roberts) and the track itself (elimination of the West banking segment in 2005) it is still the most important road race in America.
Back in 1977, Steve Baker won the Formula 1 Daytona 200 on his Yamaha TZ750 2-stroke and also won the 250 race after Kenny Roberts retired. A young Eddie Lawson won the rookies 250 race – in just 7 years he would be 500GP World Champion. Another race that weekend though caught much attention, the AMA Superbike race. Superbikes were in their second season becoming more and more popular with fans as the concept of racing modified production bikes spread out from the West Coast of the USA.
Now defunct Cycle magazine editor Cook Neilson and his soon to be replacement Phil Schilling raced and tuned respectively a highly modified Ducati 750SS. Labeled the ‘California Hot Rod’ the 750SS may not have had the power of its Japanese competitors but it handled, something that couldn’t really be said for most Japanese machines of the period.
After success in the West Coast scene in 1974-75, the announcement of the new Superbike class for 1976 caused the pair to turn their attention to the new series. Using their voice in the magazine, Cook and Phil told the blow by blow story of their racing project in a series of articles entitled ‘Road Racer’.
Neilson (pronounced Nelson) came 3rd in the inaugural Daytona race but returned in 1977 with the bike featuring a bright blue paint scheme hence the name change to ‘Old Blue’. To have a chance at Daytona victory the bike was heavily modified:-
The pair modified their Ducati with, among other things, a set of 87mm Venolia pistons (pushing capacity up to 883cc), 44mm Harley-Davidson intake valves, a 5-speed Marvin Webster gearbox and Morris magnesium wheels.
link: Motorcycle Classics
When the big race got underway Neilson built an unassailable lead ultimately finishing over 30 seconds ahead of 2nd place David Emde on his Kawasaki 1000 with Wes Cooley taking his Yoshimura Suzuki to 3rd. Reg Pridmore was 4th on a BMW (boxer twin mind) with future star Mike Baldwin on a Moto Guzzi rounding out the top 5. One man you have surely heard of finished 9th. His name was Keith Code. Ducati had got its first win in the burgeoning Superbike class with a triumph of the total package over outright horsepower.
Behind wordsmith-turned racer Neilson’s straight and tight Ducati were bunches of wobbling Japanese and German bikes, many of them with overwrought suspension, causing their riders to hang on for dear life.
link: Superbike Planet
However the future tone was set as the Japanese machines would only get faster as they tamed their handling whilst the 750SS was at its peak as notes from journalists at the time show.
Pridmore’s BMW was radared at 142mph, Cooley’s Suzuki at 153.06mph. Neilson’s Ducati made all of 90 horsepower.
link: Superbike Planet
Neilson retired from racing at the end of the season and in 1979 handed over the Cycle editorship to Schilling but the victory is etched in Ducati history. At the 2008 Barber Vintage Festival, guest speaker Neilson was surprised when a perfect replica of his racer dubbed ‘Deja Blue’ prepared by Rich Lambrechts was rolled out on stage. Cook rode the bike the very next day at the Barber track and declared himself happy.
“It’s a magnificent bike,” Cook says, “only I think it’s got more compression. But it sounded the same and it felt the same, it’s absolutely amazing.”
link: Motorcycle Classics
Ducati commissioned NCR to build a new interpretation of the iconic racer in 2006. 50 bikes were made based on the Sportclassic 1000S but highly modified and sold as a track only proposition although at least one of the NCR beauties was made street legal. The name? ‘New Blue’. The bike dripped in exotic parts with a weight of 150 kg compared to the 188 kg of the street legal model (that is a weight reduction of 38 kg, or over 25%), and the power was increased by 40% reaching 116 HP.
Ten years after the Superbike victory, Marco Lucchinelli won the 1987 Battle of the Twins race at Daytona on a very different prototype Ducati that hit 165mph on the banking. The 8 valve, liquid cooled851 went on to dominate World Superbike racing winning the championship with Raymond Roche in 1990 and with Doug Polen on his Fast by Ferraci tuned machine in 1991-92 The pair also won the 1993 AMA Superbike championship. That bike was the grandfather of all modern 4-valve Ducatis.
Still no Ducati has ever won the Daytona 200. A number of Ducati mounted racers will line up on the new 848EVO this Saturday to race in the Daytona 200. Not least of them is PJ Jacobson who set the fastest time during the Dunlop tire test in January on his Celtic Racing bike and has the Ducati tuning great Eraldo Ferracci in his corner. Team Latus has also chosen the 848EVO and will field accomplished racer Jason DiSalvo. Ducati has its best chance ever of Daytona 200 victory this weekend. Who knows, if they achieve it maybe we’ll still talk about it 34 years later?
Photo of Cook Neilson on ‘New Blue’ via Wikipedia
Photo of Cook on his winning 750SS via National Superbike
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[...] 34 years after Cook Neilson won the AMA Superbike race at Daytona, Ducati has finally won the big race that has eluded it. Jason DiSalvo and Team Latus Motors Racing took the new Ducati 848EVO to victory in yesterday’s Daytona 200- the bike’s first professional road race. [...]
[...] Daytona Superbike race. After the winter the ‘California Hotrod’ emerged reinvented as ‘Old Blue’ and Neilson took the historic Daytona victory which marked him down forever in Ducati [...]