Laguna Seca, Laguna Seca ? Where have I heard that name before ? If you're anything like us, its one of those legendary places like Ahoghill or Timbuktu that you've heard of but just aren't quite sure where exactly it is. So it was for us on holiday this summer in California. We were out visiting Debby's brother in Los Angeles and were planning a drive up to San Francisco when we spotted Laguna Seca on the map. A faint bell began to ring at the back of my head and got louder and louder until it deafened me "WORLD SUPERBIKES ! LAGUNA SECA ! THAT'S NEXT SUNDAY !"

So thats how we happened to be there. We had left San Francisco at 6.45am on Sunday 13th July with a 2 hour drive to Laguna Seca Raceway, its about 30 miles from Monterey, and had arrived, bought out tickets ($55 each) and parked by 9am, just in time for the warmup lap for the WSBK race from 9.20 to 9.40am.

After that, we took a leisurely tour of the paddock area in the centre of the track, debated queuing for an Eric Bostrom poster signing and thought 'nahhhh...!', and went and found the BMW tent instead. Old habits die hard. The first race was approaching at 12 noon, so we picked a spot just above Andretti hairpin with a terrific view over most of the circuit, and slapped on the factor 15; at 10am the track temperature was already 38°C.

The race began with a prayer by the track chaplain, followed by the American National Anthem, and just after noon, the 28 lap race began. On the very first corner, straight in front us, Pierfrancesco Chili (PSG-1) , Neil Hodgson (Ducati Fila), Troy Corser (Foggy Petronas FP-1) and Eric Bostrom (Kawasaki) were all involved after Aaron Yates (Yoshimura Suzuki) fell - the race was red flagged thankfully for a restart.

Bostrom was forced to withdraw though with a dislocated right shoulder and a compressed thorax - maybe we should have gotten his autograph? Both Frankie and Neil then started running back up towards the pits in the searing heat to get their spare bikes ready - how's that for dedication ?

The full distance re-start was lead at various stages by Mat Mladin (wildcard), Regis Laconi (NCR Ducati) and Ruben Xaus (Ducati) although both of the latter fell in separate incidents. By this stage Chili had a lead of two seconds over Hodgson, and despite Hodgson pressurising for most of the last few laps, the race was taken by Chili with a lead of 3.068 seconds, or thereabouts - the second hand on my watch kept sticking... Mat Mladin rolled in in fourth position, Chris Walker in fifth, Troy Corser in eighth. What a great race. What an atmosphere ! The time now was around 2pm and we were scorched in the midday sun. We also had a 6 hour drive back to Los Angeles that evening so we reluctantly forewent the second WSBK race in favour of getting on the road back to L.A. before all the traffic started leaving the track.

OK so this is just a flavour of what we saw, smelt, heard, ate, felt, experienced etc. but we both came away mightily impressed. Not just by the track but by the whole carnival. Roll on our next WSBK race, where ever it may be...

'Ere Murray, d'ya fancy a trip abroad next year to California...?'

All photos in the Gallery