Soup columnist Roger Hayden won the Daytona 600 Supersport race but crashed out of the Superbike race. image by keith patti

Leading into Daytona, I was doing really well--I was as healthy as I've been in a long time so I couldn't wait to get the season started. Because, after I got hurt last year, the season never went as planned. So I've been waiting for a fresh start...a new beginning, I guess you could say. When we tested at Daytona, things went okay. They weren't perfect, but at the same time, I didn't think that I was riding all that great.

My winter was really good. We had a few good tests where I felt that I went quicker than I had at those tracks when we'd tested in previous years. Everything was looking good for me. The bikes were a little bit better than they'd been before. I was feeling healthier, actually, than I was the years before.

I think everybody knows how it is before they go to Daytona. That last week, it's hard to sleep, and you're ready to line up and put all the talk aside and do the work.

When we got down there, everything went pretty smooth and I was looking forward to the weekend. On the Superbike, we were about fourth-quick the first day. On the 600, I started out slow. I was second in the beginning, but Hacking had about 0.6 of a second on us. I was definitely worried about that, but also in practice I was having kind of a hard time finding a good, clean lap to get my rhythm going. That also played in the back of my mind. I knew, too, that even in practice the times were coming. I didn't really feel like I was on the edge yet, or even close. I knew there was still a lot left in reserve and that gave me a good feeling. I ended up qualifying second for Supersport. Hacking's and my times were pretty close but still not as good as last year. I think a big problem with that is that it's hard to find a clean lap during qualifying at Daytona. Also, I remember last year in qualifying, we had a nice little tailwind, which always helps. But either way, I was on the front row, and I had a good qualifying spot for the 600. I found a race tire the next morning, Thursday morning. I did the whole session, stayed out the whole time on one tire. I was really looking forward to the race.

To be honest, when I first started testing the 600, I didn't really get on with it that well. But, at Daytona, I was really strong on it, even from the get-go. Jamie and I had a bit of a talk after qualifying.

We were both quicker than everybody else. It's easy, at Daytona on a Supersport bike, to get a draft, thyen stuff the guy in turn one, slow him down, stuff him in the first Horseshoe, stuff him in the chicane, and all yoou do is slow the pace down. We kind of had a talk that we would not do that. If you did just blow by on the straightaway, we wouldn't stuff each other in the corners, and would instead try to pull away. Then the last five, six, seven laps, whenever the person wanted to make their move, they could.

As the laps were winding down, we got the white flag, and I just tried to put my head down and tried to do the best lap I could. Now, watching the race on TV, I see that he made a bit of a mistake in the infield that gave me some breathing room. It felt good to beat him, because after last year, we battled and then he kicked my butt the rest of the year. I won Mid-Ohio, but that doesn't really count because he got a bad start and got messed up with some slower guys. But I felt good, and the bike was working really well, and I felt strong. It was a tough race, leading those 19 laps or whatever. It wasn't easy. That's one thing that I feel like I need to learn to do, is control the pace of a race, and I feel like I did that. But at the same time, I think it just showed what the whole season's going to be like. Jamie's going to be right there. We're on equal equipment this year, and it's going to be a dogfight to the end. Also, Tommy, my brother, actually had the fastest lap time of the race. I think all the critics out there have me and Jamie sailing out, but I haven't forgot when Tommy rode that 636 in the 750 championship, being on an underpowered bike, and he actually lost that championship in the pits. So I feel like he's going to come on. He's going to get that thing working, and he's going to be a lot stronger. I think that championship's back as competitive as ever.

I was beat up Sunday morning. I knew I was going to be a little stiff, and then when I woke up, I was definitely sore. One thing with this Superbike, she won't let me down easy. She wants me to remember for a few days what happened.

Then in Superbike, in qualifying, I struggled with a few different things. I think, every year at Daytona, it's about grip. I was just like everybody else. I was trying to get my bike to hook up better in a few areas. I came in the first time, and I put my soft tire on that was supposed to move me up the sheets. To be honest, I was all over the place. I overshot the first Horseshoe, and then I overshot the second Horseshoe. I was actually about two seconds a lap slower on it. I knew that was a bit of a problem. So when I came back in, I kind of sat down and regrouped, then I went back out and actually went faster on my second soft tire. It wasn't actually a qualifier like a few of the other people report that they are. It was just a soft tire. My second lap on it, I did a :38.7, which I didn't think was going to be good enough to be on the front row. But that was enough for a front-row start. I was pretty happy about that. I got one front row, and that was last year, the second race of the season. After that, I never even sniffed the front row again so I felt good. Actually, even in practice I felt really good on the Superbike. The other top two guys, Spies and Mladin—it's hard to feel too good about yourself when you're still a second and a half a lap off the pace. That played in the back of my mind. Also, I felt that our bike was a little better than it was last year. I was really looking forward to that race, more than I was to the Supersport race. I felt like my times were pretty good all weekend.

I got an okay start. Coming out of turn one right after the start, I think I was fifth. I got one guy because I think they didn't backshift a gear for turn one so I was fourth, and I stayed there for a couple of laps, but Eric really pulled a nice little gap on us for the opening laps. I kind of faded back to fifth, and was kind of hanging on there. I felt okay. In the infield, I felt like I had a little bit more grip than one of the guys in front of me. I was just trying to stay patient, and I could see that Eric was coming back to the lead group. At that time, Mat was second. I didn't want to get too impatient. I was just kind of sitting there. I actually, going across the stripe, ran the fastest lap that I ran of the race. It was actually after I dropped back a little bit, and then kind of going into turn one, I was back on the group.

Then on the exit, I can't really tell you what happened. I remember the crash—the rear end just broke loose, and it went to the locks. I thought it was going to lowside me, but it hooked up and threw me over the top pretty good. I hit my head. I tried to stand up and I fell down a few times, and finally I gathered myself and got off the track. It was definitely an unfortunate accident for me but fell down again.

Akira Yanagawa came over and did some testing for Kawasaki at Daytona, so hopefully I can try a few things he used that are supposed to be improvements. I think it shows the level of support we're getting from Japan, that he came over just to test new parts for us, for the US tracks, not tracks over there in Japan. That was his main goal. He didn't come over for a race result. He just came over strictly to test stuff to try to help our team and our bike come along better. Yanagawa's been around for a while, raced World Superbike, won in World Superbike, and tested the MotoGP bike. He's a good guy, too. He's really nice, speaks a bit of English. He had his two kids over here with him, too. They're pretty funny: his boy was just like Dennis the Menace. I got on the Internet one day in the truck that Yanagawa was using, and the kid was yelling stuff at me in Japanese and shooting a little gun at me. These little darts kept hitting me. So I just moved on because I had no idea what he was saying, but it was clear he wasn't too happy. It was pretty funny. They had pictures of us all drawn up in the truck.

Watching those two kids, I'd hate to fly over 13 hours from Japan with those two. I think I'd have to given them a little Nyquil or something.