JAMES WHITHAM
1999 WSS, Donington Park
James Whitham had been unfairly given the flick from the Suzuki World Superbike squad at the end of 1998, and held out for a WSB ride which never came. Instead 1999 saw Whit as a fast gun for hire. Then the Belgarda Yamaha World Supersport squad came knocking in time for his home round at Donington
"I have to pick this one as it was against the odds and a bit of a rude awakening to racing 600s - and it led to a few years' good, fun work with Belgarda. At the start of the year I'd been looking for rides, basically pushing away those I thought were beneath me, but took the offer from Yamaha in World Supersport. So I rode the R6 for the first time and came into the pits and told 'em it was chattering and they said, 'They all do that. We could try heavier fork oil but that causes other problems.' Every time I came in with a problem they'd look at each other and explain this was just the way it was. It were a world away from my superbike.
"Today's 600s have more race-ready geometry, but not back then. The night after qualifying I were dead worried. I'd pushed hard and was ninth on the grid. I had to win else I looked shit. On top of that if I had a bad result I wouldn't get a ride anywhere. The night before the race I thought, 'You knob, Whitham. There's a queue of people out there who think you're shit.' I've never been much of a qualifier so I knew I'd get some time back, but come the race I was down to 15th by the first corner. The second lap was better as I passed about eight riders and eventually I was passing blokes who had out-qualified me.
"The team put out a lap board with 1m 37.3 on it, and I thought, 'Bloody Hell, a few years ago that were good on a superbike.' Thing with the R6 was that as bad as it felt, it didn't get any worse. By the time I got to the leaders after eight or nine laps I knew that unless something went wrong I'd beat them. I remember thinking how mint it was going to be winning from so far back. And it was."
