FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

CONTACT: My Alien Friends (888) WEE-PROBE

DEVIL'S TOWER, MT (VPI) Man, there's nothing like a tire test to really put perspective on things. Heck, A really good rubber thrashing at a weird-ass, banks-o-plenty place like Daytona (the World Center of Racing) can reveal more Universal Truths and Cosmic Revelations than all the Art Bell late night Area 51 radiothons combined.

No, Really.

Some of you know exactly what I'm talking about; others should Google, because it's what you people do.

The nut is this: Something weird happened when Jason became an Astronaut (as opposed to an Argonaut, which made for a great movie). You see, DiSalvo's hell-for-potent Yamaha decided to go solo during a flier of a lap, and Young Jason was cast asunder. Gravity entered the picture, and the momentary sky pilot was injured in a vile slashing that required many stitches that we hope are almost gone as things heal up.

But, as in any situation where exotic, rare, and otherwise unexplored machinery is damaged, the techies involved look for answers as to how it all went down. Hey, part of the exotic, rare, and otherwise unexplored machinery in this equation is DiSalvo, so we must look at any and all digital transcripts from the Incident and find out what caused man and machine to endure such trauma.

It is here where we must depend on silicon voodoo, AKA the on-board Black Box that records all kinds of data from the motorcycle for analysis later by the team's talented techies.

As you know doubt know from your letter-by-letter meticulous perusal of this site's news dispatches, there were heavy, pendulous doubts as to whether the Black Box could have survived the inferno that became DiSalvo's R1. Much like a Wicked Witch with water thrown on it, there was a whole mess o' melting that it was believed reduced the Black Boxes' ability to deliver any data from the crash. There was one obvious bit of data you could get from examining the box of course, which was that there had been an "extreme thermal event" that turned most of the bike into black, smoldering, stinky goo. But hey, it would have been nice to have some data of what happened before the fire, so perhaps knowledge could be obtained to try and stop this from happening again. It was widely believed that the Box was too toasted to download any tales of pre-explosion woe.

But low and behold, there was still some data in that damaged BB. Amazing, really. And this data was accessed by Yamamtechies, downloaded and kept Top Secret in order to protect precious Strategy, Tactics and Settings.

But nothing stays secret for long when there are Hackers about.

This is especially true when the Hackers are really good, or Crack Hackers as they are known 'round here. And we have been in touch with such a Hack that broke into the Yamaha Mainframe, and armed with his little virtual Hacking Sword probed the silicon halls until he found the file in question, which recorded What Really Happened when Jason's R1 left the track and he subsequently left the R1.

Would you like to know what he discovered? Curious, are you? Of course. Stupid question.

We asked him of course, and he was a bit contrary about it at first. But we complimented his carbon fiber pen protector, fingerless Hacking gloves and Born to Intrude tattoo and he lightened up a bit. He said he'd tell us what the R1's Black Box said, provided that we called him Lord Mambo Viper Scorpion Death Agent. A lengthy moniker, to be sure, but we endeavor to please 'round here, especially when it is necessary for Top Secret data acquisition.

What he told us was startling.

"You'd best gird your loins, for what I have to tell you is startling," the rotund little Hacket (like a Hobbit only with shoes) revealed. "Something otherworldly happened in this crash, and I know this by what the Box doesn't show, rather than what it does."

"You speak in riddles, Lord Dorko Viper Poop Specter," said I. My mangling of his handle shut him down for a good five minutes, until I corrected my grievous error. Then he spoke again.

"The first part of the data reveals the usual stuff, like throttle position, gear selection, crank speed and DiSalvo's current salary. But then, seconds after the rear wheel loses traction in the grass, there is . . . missing time."

The light in this dude's basement dimmed ominously, and his voice became low and scratchy. His Hacking gloves trembled, and I made a mental note of the location of the nearest emergency exit. He continued.

"There's only one reason why there are 30 missing seconds in the data," he whispered. "Jason DiSalvo was abducted from his Superbike by non-illegal Aliens, examined very briefly, and then returned when they realized they'd grabbed the wrong guy. I think they meant to get Eric Bostrom, 'cause he's, you know, a Bostrom. Some even think his brother Ben is actually an Alien, from somewhere in the constellation Orion."

Ah yes. This explains much.

"I think Jason's nasty arm injury was caused when they ripped out the Alien IV line in their haste to return him to Daytona, the World Center of Racing," opined the Hack. "The R1 was actually hit by a heat beam, causing it to explode and create a black plume of Portobello proportions which, like a bit of misdirection from a magician, concealed the fact that a star Yamaha rider was sucked up into the stratosphere by a tractor beam and then spit out."

Man. And here I thought Jason just had your run-of-the-mill violent get-off with ensuing violent explosion and exotic machine meltdown. Who knew?

Tractor beams. Hackets. AMA dismissals. Strange and startling things are happening, and the New Year hasn't even arrived yet. Hooboy.