However, despite Spies’ class-leading performance today, he was still over a second off the time (1:25.928 vs. 1:24.917) he set to claim the pole when the Superbike series visited the venue back in August.

The Texan explained, “The cool conditions aren’t helping and the track is a little bit dirty. Plus I’m probably not pushing quite as hard as I did the last time we were here. The bike seems to be working good. I just wanted to get fastest time right here and see how the bike is working.”

While Spies isn’t expected to go all out on Sunday, needing just a 13th place ride to secure the ’06 crown, it was important for him to set a solid time today in order to ease his path to, and in, the 100k final -- heat race or no heat race.

“We really don’t know if we’re going to get the heat races in or not if it’s pouring rain,” Spies said. “If it rains all day tomorrow I doubt they’re going to be able to get everything in on Sunday. I was thinking about that in case they run the race based just on this practice session, I wanted to be on the front row regardless. We’ll go out tomorrow and if we’re able to get the heats in, we’ll go for fastest heat to try to be on the front row of the main race.”

Asked if he was nervous heading into what could be a career-altering weekend, Spies commented, “It would have been better if we didn’t have to wait a month, but I hadn’t been thinking about it a whole lot. A little bit but I haven’t gotten nervous any; I haven’t lost any sleep over it. I’m not going to blame anybody else, but if anything happens, it will most likely be out of my hands. We’re just going to do what we have to do and try to get in a little hole in the race where nobody is at and spend most of my time there.”

That ‘little hole’ will likely be just behind the leader(s), as Spies is in full-on championship mode this weekend. “I’d like to say we could go for it. Everybody has probably played a little catch-up and I’m probably riding a little tense, but if it was as easy as it was two months ago, yeah, we’d go for the win. Sometimes you have a weekend like that and last time we were here was a weekend where we were cruising around ten second out front. But I don’t think it’s going to be like that this weekend. I’m going to be riding stiff and it’s the last race of the year so everybody is going to be laying it on the line. Hopefully I can get a good start on Sunday, maybe lead the first couple laps, let everyone get spread out, and start heading backwards.”

Fortunately for Spies, his broken wrist suffered at VIR is giving him little difficulty this weekend. While the month off didn’t prove easy on his nerves, it was good for healing. “Today’s the first time I’ve gotten to ride the bike with one grip on the bike. I can feel a lot more now. It’s probably 80-85%. If we had to go out and ride as hard as we could… on the bike it’s not so bad. If someone gives me a real good handshake or if I hit it on something I can feel it, but it’s mainly healed. Just having that week-and-a-half off where I didn’t ride a bike helped a lot. After I broke it, it was two straight days of riding, and then the inflammation, and a week later racing again, so it was hard to heal.”

Heat Race 1 Front Row:

1. Ben Spies (Suzuki) 1:25.928
2. Jake Zemke (Honda) 1:26.429
3. Jake Holden (Suzuki) 1:26.778
4. Tommy Hayden (Kawasaki) 1:27.084

Heat Race 2 Front Row:

1. Aaron Yates (Suzuki) 1:26.128
2. Mat Mladin (Suzuki) 1:26.546
3. Ben Bostrom (Ducati) 1:26.827
4. Steve Rapp (Suzuki) 1:27.194

Heat Race 3 Front Row:

1. Miguel DuHamel (Honda) 1:26.156
2. Neil Hodgson (Ducati) 1:26.736
3. Roger Hayden (Kawasaki) 1:26.961
4. Matt Lynn (Suzuki) 1:27.790

Note: Each heat race is five laps long. The winner of the fastest heat race will be awarded the point for pole. The top five riders from each heat will advance to the main and the remaining riders will fight for the final five spots in the main (16-20th) in a ‘Last Chance Qualifier’ heat. The riders that fail to advance to the main will race in Sunday’s consolation race.