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Ben Spies (born July 11, 1984 in Germantown, Tennessee), also known as "Elbowz" due to his riding style where his elbows protrude outward, is a professional motorcycle road racer who turned pro in 2000.

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He won the AMA Superbike Championship for Yoshimura Suzuki in 2006 (only the second time since 1999 that his team-mate Mat Mladin had not won it), and successfully defended it in 2007 and 2008.

For 2009 he raced in the Superbike World Championship series for the Yamaha Italia team; winning the championship in his rookie year by six points over rival Noriyuki Haga. He started racing on Yamaha YSR50cc bikes with the Central Motorcycle Roadracing Association in Texas as a pre-teen. Spies currently lives near Lake Como in Italy.

Spies moved to the factory Yamaha Motor Racing Team alongside 2010 champion Jorge Lorenzo in 2011. He started the season with a sixth place finish in Qatar, before crashing out of the next two races at Jerez and Estoril. After another sixth place in France, Spies achieved his first podium of the season with a third place in Catalunya, having held off Repsol Honda's Andrea Dovizioso. Spies suffered another crash at the British Grand Prix, crashing out at Turn 1 in wet conditions.

Two weeks later, Spies narrowly missed out on pole position for the Dutch TT in Assen; he qualified second, just 0.009 seconds behind Gresini Racing's Marco Simoncelli. Spies and team-mate Lorenzo jumped ahead of Simoncelli at the start, and took the first two placings into the first corner. Simoncelli and Lorenzo later made contact and both riders fell, giving Spies a 2.5-second lead after the first lap. Spies extended his advantage to almost eight seconds by the end of the race, and took his first MotoGP win in the process.

After his win at Assen, Spies finished each of the following five races in the top five, taking fourth places at Mugello and Laguna Seca, fifth places at the Sachsenring and Brno, and concluding the streak with his third podium of the season – a third place – at the Indianapolis Grand Prix. Having qualified second, Spies made contact on the first lap with Dovizioso, and as a result, fell to as low as ninth place before making several late braking moves to progress through the order.

Sixth at Misano was followed by fifth at Aragón and another sixth at Motegi helped to maintain his fifth place in the championship. At the Australian Grand Prix, Spies crashed during qualifying at over 250 km/h (155 mph), sliding into the gravel, resulting in a concussion and tearing to his ribs, but managed to qualify seventh on the grid. However, his injuries forced him to pull out on race morning, and were also a factor in his similar withdrawal from the Malaysian Grand Prix, having qualified 16th out of the 17 riders and after two further practice crashes. Spies finished the season with a second place finish in Valencia, missing out on victory at the line, to Casey Stoner by just 0.015 seconds, having capitalised on a previous error by Stoner to take the lead.

His biography "Taking It To The Next Level" was published by David Bull Publishing and was launched at the Indianapolis Grand Prix on August 26, 2011.

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