Chaz makes Aprilia Germany proud.

Chaz Davies gives team Aprilia Germany a day to remember as he achieves his 250cc career best by coming finishing well in the top ten in a fantastic and well overdue sixth place.

Team Boss Dieter Stappart tells us the story from the Team Aprilias Germany box.

Sunday was a really glorious early summer day on The Island , I am happy to say. No doubts that it was going to stay dry for all racing, and the temperatures would climb well into the 20s. The Warm-up was OK, running in fresh pistons, and at the end both riders were in the Top 15 again, with Stiggy 14th and Chaz just some hundredths behind him.

Chaz had surprised us all when he entered the pits with about 25 seconds to go, stating,

"(After) a change to the front fork the chattering was worse, and I had looked at the TV-screen coming down from the hill and thought I saw '5 mins to go', so I wanted to come in, make a quick change and go out again, but it must have been 50 seconds," said Chaz.

I think I have said it before, but sometimes I really wonder what racers are thinking during a lap. I mean, looking at the TV screen on a flying lap, come on..Chaz obviously had forgotten that he was shown "T 2", for "two minutes to go", when he had passed the pits the lap before.

Johan confessed he had watched the TV screen before as well.

"In Assen last year, coming out of Strubben, I always looked at the screen and saw that Anthony (his teammate then) was leading, and I always was shouting a loud 'Yeah' into my helmet."

Anyway.

I believe everybody can imagine that a lot of thoughts went through our heads before the race, and the fact that our start was one hour later than usual didn't help at all. After having been in the Top 12 in qualifying of course we were hoping not only to get both riders into the points, but also to get one into the top ten. After our good showing so far all of us would have been really disappointed not to collect points, but of course everybody knew how quickly this could happen.

When Chaz wasn't exactly quick off the line, I already thought 'please, not again', but Chaz was very much ok later on that first lap.

"Stiggy passed me off the line", he said later, "but in the second left I got past de Puniet, and then caught Stiggy again into the hairpin. After that I went after Rolfo and nearly hit him in a quick lefthander because he was going off the throttle so early, but then later on this lap I could get around him on the outside."

With Nieto and Debon having crashed during the third lap that had meant Chaz being eighth after lap one, seventh after the move on Rolfo after lap two, back to eighth when de Puniet got past, and up to seventh when the Frenchman crashed on lap five.

Seventh became an incredible sixth one lap later when Chaz passed Aoyama going into the hairpin.

"Because he must have missed his braking and ran very wide there," commented Chaz.

Since Chaz had before been catching the works-Honda at a rate of about half a second a lap, we were hoping that he could get away from Aoyama, and that's exactly what he did.

"I could then see that I was catching Toni (Elias) little by little", Chaz beamed. "But later on I had a bit of a problem with my rear tyre starting to pump a bit, and he went away again."

Chaz had been up to just one second behind Elias and then slowly started to fall back, but even so steadily increasing the gap to Aoyama.

So we were sixth after six laps only, and this 25-lap-race became a very long one indeed.

While Chaz was going so well up front, Stiggy wasn't much hanging around either. Johan had lost some time in the first three or four laps, having been in tenth place after the start and 11th the two following laps, just behind Smrz.

He got past Smrz on lap six and was ninth again (with de Puniet out), but fell back again to 10th when Guintoli came from behind.

"With Guintoli in front it somehow was easier for me", Johan confessed later. "Before I had had difficulties finding a good rhythm."

The duo started to catch Rolfo, and then Guintoli was better in passing the Italian and quickly went away. Johan passed Rolfo one lap later.

"But by then Guintoli had opened a little gap and I couldn't close it anymore," he commented.

So we were sixth and ninth, with still eight laps to go, and I tell you none of you reading this can imagine how long eight laps can be. It seemed like a dream to come true, both our guys in the Top Ten, but hardly anybody dared to talk to the other, and I for myself just tried to stare straight ahead, checking silently from lap to lap that the distances shown on the pit-boards were correct, and the number of laps to go.

Chaz had settled into the mid-36-bracket, mostly still running away from Aoyama. I tried not to get even more nervous when with two laps to go Chaz did his only lap in this race over 1min 37secs, but in vain, as you probably can imagine.

"I was really riding comfortably", Chaz told us later. "Not risking anything at all."

None of us of course could know this at the time beining, standing at the pit wall. So for me and probably all of us it were a really long two laps, but then finally the chequered flag came out for the winner Porto, for the new Champion Pedrosa in fourth place (congratulations to our old friend Mike Leitner, Pedrosa's chief mechanic!), and then came Elias in fifth, and then finally Chaz rushed over the crest into the start-finish-straight, and not much later Stiggy in ninth spot.

What a relief, what a joy. For the potential of our team, considering the amount of sponsorship that we have and the conditions we are working in, it was a perfect weekend.

The result didn't go unnoticed in other areas of the paddock, shown by the fact that Carmelo Ezpeleta, boss of Dorna, shortly after the race turned up in the pit to congratulate us, Aprilia's racing boss Jan Witteveen showed his appreciation as well, and I don't want to let it be unnoticed that my old friend G?nther Wiesinger, editor of "Motorsport Aktuell", for the first time this year arrived in our pit to get some quotes from Chaz.

I have won many races in my life, in Formula 1, Touring Cars with BMW and then with Bikes after that, but this one Australian Grand Prix will get a special place in my memory as well.