Suzuki begins 2010 tests at Fontana

From Team Suzuki News Service

Team Rockstar Makita Suzuki's Tommy Hayden and Blake Young are fine-tuning their race bikes and gearing up to make Suzuki's championship-winning GSX-R1000 a winner again in 2010.

Hayden and Young were recently out on their new 2010 GSX-R1000s for two days of testing at Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, CA before the beginning of the AMA Superbike season at Daytona International Speedway next March.

"So far, so good," Hayden commented. "Testing has been going well and things have been really smooth. We have a lot of stuff to work on, but so far it's been positive and feedback has been good. There are several small changes here and there that we've made to the bike and hopefully they'll add up to a big improvement once we get closer to the start of the season. There's a lot more horsepower on this bike; I can definitely feel the difference."

Young is poised to challenge Hayden for the title now that seven-time champion Mat Mladin has retired.

"This was our first test of the year and it went really well," he said. "Every year Suzuki seems to outdo themselves and make the GSX-R1000 better and better and so far that seems to be the case again this year. It's still early and we're testing a lot of things, but it's on track to being better than the 2009 bike. One noticeable change is a large increase in horsepower."

Peter Doyle, after working with Mladin on his championship run, is now Young's crew chief.