We’re just a day away from the start of the first AMA road race of the season and the beginning of another season of Superbike racing. I did a blog entry two months ago detailing who would be racing in the AMA series this season. What I haven’t done is list all the big name crew chiefs and lead mechanics which will be in the series this season. Many times the guys spinning wrenches and managing laptops are the unsung heroes of the Superbike series. This coming weekend’s visit to Daytona International Speedway may be the best example of this in years. The new track layout means there are now slow first gear turns in the infield, along with the WFO run on the east banking. The track surface continues to degrade and is made trickier because of the transition from the new track surface onto the banking which supposedly add a pretty big bump. Many of the factory teams actually build their bikes in their US shops rather than having trick parts shipped in from true factories. The tuner’s job this year will be tougher than ever before and the folks that win races may well be thanking their crew even more than in the past.

The list of stars behind the scenes in the paddock this year may be the best in years. Al Luddington, Ray Plumb, David McGrath and Merlyn Plumlee fill out the always impressive Honda factory crew line-up. Over at Erion, the pairing of Kevin Erion and Rick Hobbs lead the list of names of people with a successful history in the AMA series. Even the privateer teams like the new Hotbodies Honda team has big guns since their crew will include Mike Velasco, one of the most famous tuners in AMA history. Yoshimura Suzuki has an amazing crew with Don Sakakura, Peter Doyle, Reg O”Rourke, Katsu Yanagawa and Tom Houseworth. Michael Jordan’s Suzuki crew has ex-Mladin crew chief Amar Bazzaa and the ex-Harley Superbike squad from Gemini racing supporting their effort. M4 Suzuki will have WERA legend Keith Perry handling their wrenches. Ducati has AMA regular Gary Medley and many of the factory Ducati mechanics that worked with Hodgson in World Superbike. Kawasaki returns with Mike Preston and Joey Lombardo as their big names, while factory supported Attack Kawasaki has Richard Stamboli and Jerry Daggett for their name dropping. Finally, Yamaha has a less famous crew of wrenches but they are headed by Tom Halverson who has been a powerhouse behind Yamaha for ages. That is an impressive list of talent lined up behind the factory riders in the AMA.

But one name is once again missing from that list of tuning talent in the AMA paddock, that of Victor Fasola. Fasola has towered over the AMA scene for over 20 years (both figuratively and literally…the guys is something like 6” 8″ tall!) and he has tuned or handled crew chief duties for winning riders like Scott Russell, Tom Kipp, Tripp Nobles, Doug Polen, Aaron Yates and Anthony Gobert. He has worked with the Kawasaki, Ducati and Suzuki factories and helped bring them championships in Superstock, Supersport, Superbike and World Superbike. He has also tuned for many of the fast “local guys” in the Atlanta area in both WERA and CCS and even tuned on some seriously fast street bikes. An impressive list of accolades…

Vic has been in and out of the AMA paddock for the past few years. His last visit was in 2003 as the crew chief for the Ducati Austin Superbike team with riders Anthony Gobert and Giovanni Bussei. Unfortunately, that season was plagued with rider-team conflict, which resulted in Gobert being fired. The end of the season brought an announcement about Eric Bostrom being signed as lead rider and a bigger commitment from the Ducati factory, definitely exciting news for any crew chief. Sadly, Vic’s wife passed away in the Spring of ‘04 and Vic resigned his position with Ducati Austin to spend time with his son, extended family and friends. By the end of the summer of ‘04 Fascola’s name again appeared in the AMA paddock this time as the crew chief of an Aprilia Superbike team that was being formed with riders Mike Hale and Matt Wait. The team made a big PR splash announcing their intention of running a few races in ‘04 and the full ‘05 AMA Superbike season. Vic headed off to Italy to work with the factory race department in building the bikes and the two riders showed up at a couple of AMA races to get everyone psyched for their first race. Then the team suddenly imploded when the team owner failed to raise the needed money and Fasola was out of work again.

Fasola is currently working in the car racing arena but he’ll definitely be missed in the Daytona pits this coming weekend and I hope he can get back into motorcycle racing in the near future.

[image from the Ducati web site.]