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James Toseland (born 5 October 1980 in Sheffield, South Yorkshire), is an English motorcycle racer. Toseland is the reigning 2007 World Superbike Champion on a Ten Kate Honda, who also won the 2004 World Superbike Championship on a Ducati. As well as being a motorcyclist, Toseland is also an accomplished pianist and singer, who performs regularly with his band "Crash" when not at home in the Isle of Man.

Toseland quickly worked his way up through the ranks from 125cc racing in the UK Superteen series and sprang to prominence in the late nineties when he dominated the Honda CB500 cup series aged 17. He was picked up to ride a Supersport Honda and won races at national level. As a result he was signed to the factory Honda World Supersport squad where he rode for two years with mixed results and a number of injuries. He joined the British Superbike Championship series in 2000, riding for Paul Bird's Vimto-sponsored team and getting good results on a Honda VTR.

In 2001 aged 20, Toseland joined the GSE team to partner Neil Hodgson in World Superbikes. Having never taken a top 5 finish in either the British Superbike Championship or the Supersport World Championship, he was not initially as competitive as Hodgson. But by late 2002 he was challenging for top 5 results and took 7th place overall that year. In 2003 the team was more competitive than ever, allowing James to take his first win at Oschersleben and 3rd in the championship.

In 2004 Toseland joined the factory Ducati team as second rider to the experienced Regis Laconi, and pipped Laconi and Chris Vermeulen to the title at the final meeting of the season. 2005 proved to be more of a struggle for Toseland, with a lack of team support as well as the returning Suzuki and Yamaha teams, and the improving Honda camp of five riders including Chris Vermeulen and Pierfrancesco Chili. This combination of factors ended the domination of Ducati, and Troy Corser took the championship on a Suzuki, with Toseland finishing 5th.

For 2006 Toseland switched to the Winston Ten Kate Racing Honda racing team, replacing the MotoGP-bound Chris Vermeulen, where he rode alongside Australian Karl Muggeridge. He won the season-opener in Qatar, and finished 2nd in the championship behind Troy Bayliss. He was contacted to replaced injured Toni Elías for the Fortuna Honda team for a one-off appearance in MotoGP, but this didn't happen for sponsor-related reasons.

Toseland was linked to the D'antin Ducati satellite team in MotoGP in 2006, and received an offer to ride for them in 2007. D'antin have not performed well in recent years however, and Toseland turned the offer down, not willing to make up the grid on a bike that wasn't competitive.

Toseland remained in WSBK for 2007 with Ten Kate Racing Honda, despite a firm offer from the Pramac d'Antin team to race in MotoGP. Toseland posted a first/second combination at the first meeting in Qatar, and at Philip Island. He won one race in each of the first five meetings of the year. At Assen he almost took a pair of wins but he was passed by Bayliss, losing by 0.009 seconds. Toseland won his first ever World Superbike double at Brands Hatch on August 5th giving him a 66 point lead in the championship. In the final race at Magny-Cours, he claimed the 2007 World Superbike title with a pole position, seventh position in Race 1, and a sixth place in Race 2, to leave him 2 points ahead of Japan's Noriyuki Haga.

Toseland was again linked with the Pramac d'Antin MotoGP team, although rumours had also abounded of a ride with a Honda outfit, and even of Ten Kate making the step up to the premier class and taking Toseland with them. But eventually Toseland confirmed a move to MotoGP for 2008 on 1 August 2007 when he announced that he had signed a one-year contract with factory supported Yamaha team Tech 3.

Toseland remained at Tech3 for 2008 and 2009. He left at the end of 2009 to return to World Superbike with Yamaha essentially swapping places with Ben Spies.

from Wikipedia

James Toseland

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