Two more titles for Barkley

From EB Speed

Coming into the final event of the CMDRA's 2009 season, Ethan Barkley had a sizeable lead in both of his racing divisions. In the RCC Turbos Pro Street Series he had a 118-point lead, and a 116-point advantage in the Mission Springs Brewing Co. Street Series. Barkley only needed to qualify on both bikes to secure his seventh and eighth national titles.

Saturday's qualifying session went extremely well. Aboard his turbocharged '06 Suzuki GSX-R1000, Barkley posted a run his competitors won't soon forget. With the boost turned up and the track prep nearly perfect the scorboards flashed 7.608 at 187.22 in the second round. That was over a full tenth of a second quicker than Barkley's best pass to date, and was over three tenths ahead of his nearest competitor. On his '09 Suzuki Hayabusa, 'Snow White', Barkley continued to make smooth consistent passes in the Street class and qualified fifth out of 22 competitors.

Clear skies greeted racers and fans for Sunday's elimination rounds. First up was the Street Class '09 Busa. Barkley wasn't pushing the bike too hard and was running a fairly conservative dial-in of 9.55. He was focused all day, cutting great reaction times and making error free runs. After five rounds he found himself in the finals and ran a 9.56 to take the win.

Since Barkley qualified number one on the Pro Street GSX-R, he had a bye run in round 1. He decided to run a slightly more aggresive clutch tune-up to see if it would net a better time. Unfortuatnely the bike bogged slightly off the line and only ran an 8.22@186 mph. In round 2 the descision was made to see how much boost could be put through the 999cc motor. Barkley lined up against Ken Froese on his turbocharged Hayabusa. It was a great drag race, with Barkley pulling out the win with a record setting 7.653@194.59mph. That would stand as the fastest pass by a Canadian aboard a Pro Street motorcycle.

In the finals Barkley met number two qualifier Dave Burleigh on his turbocharged Hayabusa. Barkley decided to leave the same tune up in the bike. The GSX-R left the line extremely hard and was on a record pass until the 900-foot mark, when the motor started to backfire and lost power. He still took a convincing win over Burleigh's 7.977@183.78 mph with a stout 7.69 at a slowing 181mph.

It was a fantastic weekend for the Suzuki Canada/Walt Healy Motorsports/EB Speed team. A season's worth of hard work and dedication culminated in an outsanding performance for the year end event. Between the two bikes, Barkley placed first at five events and finished runner-up four times on the season. He now sits atop the CMDRA's all time win list and has an unprecedented 21 CMDRA records. Barkley has ammased an unmatched eight championships in just a seven-year career with the organization.