Team Fuchs left in the Laguna Seca shade.

The factory Fuchs Kawasaki World Superbike team were outshone by the American built ZX-7RR of wildcard Eric Bostrom in Sunday's two races at Laguna Seca although had it not been for a frightening race one accident involving Akira Yanagawa the Japanese rider may have been able to challenge for the podium.

After continued problems throughout the weekend, race one was more of the same for the Fuchs Kawasaki Team on Sunday. Akira Yanagawa failed to finish race one after an incident with Colin Edwards at the infamous "Corkscrew" corner, which caused the Japanese rider to crash while Gregorio Lavilla had a lonely race and eventually finished in twelfth place. Eric Bostrom was the saving grace for Kawasaki - fighting to the flag to finish fifth.

Yanagawa was not at all happy with the tactics of Edwards, who appeared to push the Japanese rider off the circuit at the most dangerous point of the lap and making the situation even more dangerous was the fact that Akira was then hit by the following bike of Frankie Chili with the Italian rider suffering a badly bruised groin.

"The bike felt really good compared to the rest of the weekend and I got a great start, which raised my confidence," said a shaken but uninjured Yanagawa. "It was easy to keep up with the leading riders in the early laps, but coming into the "Corkscrew" Colin Edwards out braked himself and pushed me wide. I had nowhere to go and as the bike ran off the track it hooked up on the edge of the track and threw me off. I'm really sorry for Chili as he couldn't avoid my fallen bike, causing him to crash also."

Lavilla, making his first appearance at the undulating 2.238-mile circuit since 1999 chose a hard rear tyre in race one and lived to regret the decision. "That was a really hard and physical race and I left myself a lot of work to do after a bad start. There was a group of four or five riders in front of me, but I had a two- second gap that I couldn't make up throughout the race. In the end, I just had to race for some points and not make any silly mistakes. After qualifying I wasn't very happy and I almost felt like going home. But I didn't! We've learnt a lot about the suspension and tyres in the first race so now we'll have to see if the changes will help.

Sadly for Lavilla his weekend did not get any better in the second race of the day when he crashed just four laps into the 28-lap race, fortunately without injury.

"I felt confident on the grid before the second race because I thought the changes we made to the bike would help me go faster," said a disgruntled Spaniard afterwards. "In the opening couple of laps the bike was running good and I was going quickly. I was pushing the bike really hard and on the fourth lap I just lost the front end going into the first corner. The crash topped off a really bad weekend for us."

Yanagawa avoided any further contretemps and finished eighth in race two after making a poor start and he was closing on the battle for fourth place between Troy Bayliss, Eric Bostrom, Colin Edwards and James Toseland when the flag came out. Had the race been a few laps longer Akira may have been able to move up several more spots as his bike was clearly one of the strongest at the end of the race.

"My crew were great," said a happier Japanese rider. "The bike I crashed in race one was more damaged than I thought, so I had to use my spare bike. They did a great job to give me such a fast bike for race two. I didn't get the start I wanted and just tried to be as consistent as possible in the opening laps. In the end, I just tried as hard as I could and lap-by-lap I was able to pass some riders. I wish there had been another three laps!

For the American Superbike Kawasaki team Sunday was a far more productive day as Eric Bostrom, younger brother of double race winner Ben, scored a brace of fifth place finishes and spent both races in the company of Championship contenders Bayliss and Edwards, using his immense track knowledge to fend off Edwards in race two. Doug Chandler experienced mixed fortunes as he claimed ninth in race one but retired from race two after incurring a stop and go penalty.

Bostrom commented afterwards. "I think I've done a little too much racing (because of taking part in the AMA races as well) and it took the edge off my performance today. I only like racing for first place and I don't like filling the top five - but fifth in this competition is nothing to complain about."

"I felt I was riding well enough to be on the podium, but that didn't happen. I've got to take my hat off to my team - they were awesome. We started the weekend with a couple of problems and they whipped the bike into shape pretty quick. Four races later - with two wins in the national races and a pair of top fives in the international races isn't bad."

Chandler, who won two World Superbike races for Kawasaki in 1990 enjoyed his taste of annual World Superbike action but was disappointed at not being able to match the pace of his team-mate.

"Ninth is nothing to write home about in race one, but we had a decent race and I'm really happy. We got to race a couple of guys and that makes it all the more fun. In race two, I just mistimed the lights and jumped the start. After the 'Stop and Go' penalty it wasn't worth continuing so I pulled in. It's been a long weekend and I was really happy racing both the National series and the World Championships. I'd much rather be racing than watching from the stands."