Phillip Island is traditionally the first round in the World Championship by virtue of it still being high summer in Australia when the rest of us are in the icy grip of winter. Which makes sense if you're trying to get the most races possible into a crowded season.

You know what the place is like by now, so I'll not waste your time describing it in detail. But if you do want to know more you could have a look here to learn all about it.

This year, we had a few days of pre season testing before the meeting started properly, which gave everyone a chance to get dialled in on a real circuit. It also, of course, gave a number of people a chance to spread very expensive carbon fibre all over the countryside. So by the time we got started in official practice on Friday there were a fair few people who were suffering somewhat. Johnny Rea is a good example, having had to bail out from his Ten Kate Honda at something like a hundred and thirty miles per hour when it started to leak oil and then caught fire. The Ulsterman, having ended last season plagued with injury, was fortunate to get away with nothing more than bruising this time around.

So into the weekend itself, and the Brit Pack were hit again as Leon Camier went down with glandular fever. Despite his illness he did the best he could through free practice and qualifying, being sick inside his helmet twice (which I can assure you is one of the most unpleasant experiences you can have) and just missing the cut for Superpole. It's a measure of just how ill the likeable Englishman was that Aprilia told him to pull in if he felt too ill to continue and not to worry about the lost points. We'll look at how it panned out later.

Now in the pre season test, Carlos Checa had rather dominated proceedings. The Ducati goes well here, with half of all SBK races having been won by the Italian machines, and though there's no official factory team any more, Checa's Althea garage has an awful lot of faces that would be very familiar to anyone who had passed by the factory garage last year. I mean no disrespect when I say that it's a privateer team in name only. And Carlos Checa is both fast and rapidly approaching retirement, so he's got a lot to prove. He started his campaign to prove that ex GP riders really do belong in SBK by utterly dominating free practice and qualifying as well. Oh, as well as smashing the lap record to take Superpole, just for good measure. But I'm getting ahead of myself again.

As for everyone else, Johnny Rea, Leon Haslam and Sylvain Guintoli all made forays toward the front, along with the inevitable Max Biaggi. Tom Sykes showed promise on the new kawasaki, while SBK newcomers Joan Lascorz on the second Kawasaki and Eugene Laverty on the Yamaha both also turned in highly respectable performances in the Antipodean sunshine. Less impressive on their debut outings, either in the series or with their new teams, were James Toseland on the BMW Italia machine, Marco Melandri on the second Yamaha and Nori Haga on the PATA Aprilia. Michel Fabrizio bounced around the lower midfield on the Alstare Suzuki, trading places with Honda mounted Ruben Xaus. Most of these guys have perfectly good excuses for what appears on paper to be a poor showing, Toseland's BMW team for example regarding this round as little more than extended testing as they haven't been able to get the track time they've wanted so far.

So, Superpole has new rules this year, with just sixteen riders starting instead of twenty as before. The first cut saw the departure, in order, of Lascorz, Haga, Toseland and Xaus. That's some serious talent and/or experience falling by the wayside in the early stages. The next cut took Fabrizio, Sykes, local boy Josh Waters on the beautiful Yoshimura Suzuki and the battered Johnny Rea out of the picture. And after the final frenetic action, Carlos Checa was on pole on the Althea Ducati from Max Biaggi on the Aprilia, Sylvain Guintoli on the Effenbert-Liberty Ducati and Leon Haslam on the BMW taking the last front row slot after an herculean effert. Row two saw rookie Eugene Laverty on the Yamaha ahead of Jakub Smrz on the second Effenberg Ducati, Troy Corser on the second BMW and Marco Melandri on the second Yamaha.

Warmup, as we all know, means nothing in reality but is a great opportunity for riders to mess with each other's heads. Or to get some last minute adjustments, of course, whichever seems more appropriate. Troy Corser may well have been doing both as he went fastest in the rain, ahead of Sylvain Guintoli, Smrz, Haslam and Rea. Perhaps Camier found the cold wet weather helped his fever as he put in an astonishing sixth place ride, faster than Biaggi by a third of a second. But there are no points on offer for gutsy riding, at least not in warmup.

Race one saw Eugene Laverty make a scorching start to take an immediate lead from Checa, Biaggi, Haslam, Corser and Melandri. For a moment it looked as though the newcomer would really upset the bookies by taking a win on his maiden race, but just three laps in Carlos Checa stormed past, extending a third of a second lead in that same lap and simply pulling away. For this race at least, Checa was unmatched on the circuit, and to be honest little more need be said as he finished with a monster wheelie some four and a half seconds clear of the second placed rider after taking it very easy on the last lap. But behind this dominant display, things were a little more interesting and fluid. The trio behind Checa - Laverty, Biaggi and Haslam - were seperated by rather less than half a second, and were setting a cracking pace as well, so that by lap four there was a two second gap back to fifth placed Melandri who had managed to squeeze past Corser. The Australian veteran, the winningest man ever around here, was suffering massively from tyre problems and after a strong initial showing slipped back down the field to eventually finish a lonely tenth. There then followed a truly titanic battle between Haslam and Biaggi, reprising their scraps of last year and easing only when Haslam also started to experience tyre problems, allowing Biaggi to draw clear. The embattled Haslam then came under attack from Melandri, who started challenging for that last podium spot on lap ten and only stopped as the chequered flag was waved on lap twenty two. For twelve laps, Haslam, Laverty and Melandri were locked in a tight, edge of the seat fight, and it was only guts and the sheer grunt of the BMW that allowed the young Englishman to prevail, while Laverty sneaked in a naughty last corner pass to edge his team-mate back into fifth.

Race two was rather more of the same, the battle at the front being a serious, bare knuckle slugging match as Corser in particular came back in no uncertain style, making some extremely robust moves in the defence of his richly deserved fourth position before hitting a false neutral at the Honda Hairpin and then destroying his rear tyre trying to get back into contention. Leon Haslam took the lead briefly, losing it to Checa and then getitng it back befor elosing it again. The young Englishman harried and harassed Checa for a few more laps until he too suffered tyre problems and gradually dropped back, fighting all the way. First Melandri and then Biaggi slipped past, the reigning champion eventually passing his compatriot to take second place, chasing but never quite catching Checa.

While today definitely belonged to Carlos Checa, the real stars of the show in my eyes were both Brits. Leon Camier, aching, shaking and sick, rode a titanic second race to finish an astounding sixth. And in World Supersport, rookie Sam Lowes was leading into the last corner, losing out on the drag to the line to take third in his first ever visit here. The boy will go far...

And as for the rest? The BMW Italia team of Ayrton Badovini and James Toseland had a fairly mediocre time and collected just thre epoints between them. Paul Bird Kawasaki looked promising with a bike in the early stages of development, and Tom Sykes' eighth and ninth places should act as a warning shot for the others out there. Johnny Rea was looking great in race one before an error saw him run off the track and rejoin outside the points, climbing back but getting scant reward for his efforts. race two was better for the young Ulsterman, with a strong fourth place finish after a lengthy scrap with Haslam.

So we're back to Europe for the next round at a reborn Donington at the end of march. See you there!

Race One

1 Carlos Checa (Ducati)
2 Max Biaggi (Aprilia)
3 Leon Haslam (BMW)
4 Eugene Laverty (Yamaha)
5 Marco Melandri (Yamaha)
6 Michel Fabrizio (Suzuki)
7 Jakub Smrz (Ducati)
8 Tom Sykes (Kawasaki)
9 Nori Haga (Aprilia)
10 Troy Corser (BMW)

Race Two

1 Carlos Checa (Ducati)
2 Max Biaggi (Aprilia)
3 Marco Melandri (Yamaha)
4 Jonathan Rea (Honda)
5 Leon Haslam (BMW)
6 Leon Camier (Aprilia)
7 Nori Haga (Aprilia)
8 Michel Fabrizio (Suzuki)
9 Tom Sykes (Kawasaki)
10 Ruben Xaus (Honda)

Championship Standing after one round:

1 Carlos Checa 50
2 Max Biaggi 40
3 Marco Melandri 27
4 Leon Haslam 27
5 Michel Fabrizio 18
6 Jonathan Rea 17
7 Nori Haga 258
8 Tom Sykes 16
9 Eugene Laverty 14
10 Jakub Smrz 14

SB