Ben Spies Named 2010 MotoGP Rookie of The Year

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The Monster Energy Tech III Yamaha YZR-M1 of Ben Spies sits on display in the Yamaha tent at the Red Bull Indianapolis MotoGP round at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway on August 28, 2010. The '06-'08 AMA Superbike Champion and '09 World Superbike Champion added another mark to the 'can-do' list yesterday with a fine run home in 5th place in round 16 action at Philip Island in Australia, which gave him enough points to earn the 2010 MotoGP Rookie of The Year Award.
With two rounds remaining in the series, Spies has had a phenomenal year in his 'rookie' season in the bigs of MotoGP. With two podiums (2nd at Indy, 3rd in Great Britain), a pole in Indy and only two DNF's on the year, Elbowz is currently 6th in the 2010 MotoGP World Championship standings with 163 points. As announced at the Indy round at the end of August, he will be moving up to the Yamaha Factory M1 squad alongside 2010 MotoGP World Champion Jorge Lorenzo for the 2011 season.
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The headline to this story could almost be viewed as a redundant statement the way that Ben Spies has landed in the MotoGP World Championship Series in 2010, but without really being so the '09 World Superbike Champion did have to earn the title this year in what is and has been his 'rookie' series in the highest level of motorcycle road racing in the world. Coming into the 2010 season, Elbowz had the advantage of being on the top satellite Yamaha team in the series with the Monster Energy Tech 3 team, but he had also only been on about a third of the 18 tracks that the series runs on. That and getting used to a prototype machine compared to having run production-based Superbikes for the better part of his career.

But not too many people had any doubts as to what Mr. Spies could and would do, even racing amongst the top echelon of riders in the world. But Number Eleven does have what it takes to race with the best and even before the mid-point of the season, let alone the series stop in Indy where he wowed the crowd and the series' combatants with a pole position in only his 12th official ride in active competition in MotoGP (Ben rode one race at the end of '09 with Sterilgarda livery under the Tech 3 tent, and Indy was this year's 11th round.)

After winning the '06-'08 AMA Superbike Championship and the '07 AMA Superstock Championship, Spies headed to Europe to contend the 2009 World Superbike Championship, where in his 'rookie' year, he won the championship while riding for the Sterilgarda Yamaha team. Along the way he won 7 consecutive poles and 11 overall in the 14 round series, took the top spot on the podium in 14 of 28 races, and added two second-place finishes and one third-place finish to his results for the year. It was also the first American to win a World Superbike Championship since Colin Edwards in 2002, and he gave Yamaha their very first title in the series in the 22 years that the series had been competing through the 2009 season.

We can look forward to hearing more about Ben this year, as there are still the last two rounds in Portugal the last weekend in October, and then the series closes the 2010 season out the first weekend in November in Valencia. And then on to the Yamaha bigs for the 2011 season as a team mate to newly-crowned 2010 MotoGP World Champion Jorge Lorenzo.

Great job Ben, we're all real proud of you man and great to see you up there in the bigs having a good go of it! Can't wait to see the results for 2011 on the factory M1.

You can read the official releases below on Ben Spies, the 2010 MotoGP World Championship Rookie of The Year.
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Ultimate Motorcycling.com has this on Spies being named 2010 MotoGP Rookie of the Year yesterday after the Philip Island round:

http://www.ultimatemotorcycling.com/2010/ben-spies-motogp-rookie-of-the-year

And here is Motorcycle-USA.com's article about the Ben's newest accomplishment:

http://www.motorcycle-usa.com/749/8212/Motorcycle-Article/Ben-Spies-Earns-MotoGP-Rookie-of-the-Year.aspx

And from Elbowz' own website, here is the news from Down Under:

http://www.benspies.com/news/super-spies-claims-top-rookie-award-in-australia-42

And the photos from yesterday's action in Australia from Ben's site as well:

http://www.benspies.com/galleries/view/18#/image.php/image.jpg?width=600&height=400&image=/files/galleries/Gallery_18_528.jpg
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Hayden 4th, Spies 5th and Edwards 8th in MotoGP Season Opener at Qatar--BRAVO to Team USA and to SpeedTV and Dorna for Excellent HD Coverage!!

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Nicky Hayden on the #69 Team Honda RC51 is shown in the carousel while qualifying for the AMA Superbike Mid Ohio round in the summer of 2000. Hayden rode a masterful race today in the MotoGP race at the Losail circuit in Qatar to just finish off the podium. Looking more like the Nicky of old, the #69 Ducati got a rocket start off the third row in the season opener today. His level of confidence showed while battling on track with Andrea Dovizioso on the Repsol Honda and Jorge Lorenzo on the Fiat Yamaha. Hayden was simply out powered on the long front straight as Dovizioso nipped him at the line by .011 of a second for the final rostrum spot. Nonetheless, Nicky rode the wheels off the Ducati in the turns and showed why he is a former MotoGP champion and also showed that the learning curve on the Ducati has narrowed considerably. Bravo Nicky, bravo! We're looking forward to more top end speed from Ducati to get Nicky on the podium this season.
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Ben 'Elbows' Spies on the #11 Team Yoshimura Suzuki GSX-R600 powers up the hill out of turn 10 at Mid Ohio during qualifying for the 600 Supersport race in Lexington, OH. in the summer of 2005. Spies rode the wheels off of his #11 Monster Energy Yamaha YZF-M1 today in Qatar to garner a 5th place finish as well as his best finish of any of the MotoGP rounds he has thusly contested since the 2008 season. Looking like the pro and former multi-time champion he is, Spies put some passes on the #26 Repsol Honda of Dani Pedrosa and the satellite Honda of #14 Randy DePuniet to move him up the field to a fine finish in the 2010 season opener. The coverage was excellent thanks to the great folks at SpeedTV and Dorna for stepping up this year with 'live' and HD viewing. Spies got some good airtime on the tube after a rocket start off row four to 8th on the first lap, actually the first corner or two.
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Thomas Stevens on the Team Yoshimura #11 GSX-R750 leads the Vance and Hines Yamaha YZF-750's of #2 Jamie James and #45 Colin Edwards out of the carousel and onto the front straight early in the running of the AMA Superbike final at Mid Ohio in July of 1994. Edwards went on to win his first AMA Superbike race on this day to propel him onto the world scene of road racing in the last 16 years. Contesting his 7th season in the premier MotoGP class today at Qatar, Colin garnered a hard-earned 8th place finish equaling his qualifying position for the weekend in the middle of the third row. CE didn't see much airtime today on SpeedTV on his #5 Monster Energy Yamaha YZF-M1 but what he did looked great. The new HD coverage by SpeedTV and their partners with the Dorna group was magnificent! Bravo to Speed and Dorna, and to Colin, Nicky and Ben for their fine performances today!!!
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Great racing and great tv coverage of the season opening MotoGP round in Qatar met viewers today as the Americans finished 4th, 5th and 8th, while defending MotoGP and 7-Time premier class champion Valentino Rossi won the battle after early leader Casey Stoner crashed out early in the going.
And a great high def picture and wonderful coverage by the folks at SpeedTV and the television partners through the Dorna folks were just what 'The Doctor' ordered. The new HD picture and camera coverage was superb, and while racing wasn't quite 'live' as was advertised (there was an 8-10 minute delay from 'live' to DirecTV satellite from the MotoGP.com live timing feed) the overall job done by the folks that bring you MotoGP tv was most excellent and very well handled. And for a track that sits in the middle of a desert 20 miles from 'real' civilization, the track looked simply wonderful under the lights and the racing action was some of the best seen in the premier class since the inception of the 800's in the class in 2007. Maybe the six engine sealed rules helped bring this about, but after Rossi inherited the lead from Stoner's crash, 2nd through 4th were covered by only .854 of a second and Ben Spies in 5th less then two seconds back. Good racing to say the least, even some of what you could see further back in the field.
It should be an exciting season, and The Doctor sure looks to have them covered again for 2010, but the racing throughout the field should be much better this year if today was any indication whatsoever.
Again, hats and helmets off to SpeedTV and Dorna people for putting together a better and even more quality program then what we have seen in the past! Great job. Next MotoGP round in Japan April 23-25th.
If you didn't see today's race, the re-air runs on Tuesday April 13th at 4 AM EDT on SpeedTV. Don't miss it or you WILL be sorry on this one.
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Here's the official results in PDF form thanks to the MotoGP.com people:
http://resources.motogp.com/files/results/xx/2010/QAT/MotoGP/RAC/Classification.pdf?v1_6962c5f3
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And you can read a good synopsis of the race and the results here thanks to David Emmett over at his super site MotoMatters.com. Here's the link and while you're over there check out his site and some of the articles, pictures and advertisers he has. David does a great job of keeping the fans on the cutting edge of MotoGP:
http://www.motomatters.com/results/2010/04/11/2010_qatar_motogp_race_result_thrilling_.html

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Another good read on the race comes from the blokes across the pond at Crash.net. To read their version-which is a very lively write up-go here:
http://www.crash.net/motogp/race+report/158651/1/rossi_wins_qatar_thriller_stoner_falls.html

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