Monster Energy/Graves Yamaha’s Cameron Beaubier had a perfect day in imperfect conditions at Road Atlanta, the Californian having it all his way in the Honda Superbike Challenge of Road Atlanta on a day when his main rivals in the championship faltered.
Beaubier topped his teammate Josh Hayes by 4.699 seconds in the first of two wet races on a day of horrible weather in Georgia. Then he and the rest of the racers had to endure a lengthy wait as the MotoAmerica and Road Atlanta crews were forced to wait out a storm before getting the flooded track race-ready again for what turned out to be a race time of close to 5 p.m.
In race two it was Beaubier again taking victory as he watched both of the men considered to be his fiercest competition for this year’s title – Hayes and Yoshimura Suzuki’s Roger Hayden (with his second race fall of the day) – crash out of the race. With those two out, it left Beaubier to move past fast starter Jake Lewis, on the second Yoshimura Suzuki GSX-R1000, to take victory by 3.789 seconds. Lewis ended up second, pairing that with his first-race third, and giving the 19-year-old Kentuckian the first two podiums of his Superbike career in just his third and fourth Superbike races.
With Lewis finishing third behind the two factory Yamahas in race one, fourth went to Yamaha Blumaz’s Bernat Martinez with the Spaniard bettering his fourth in race one by one spot to earn the first AMA Superbike podium of his career in race two.
The Superstock 1000 class was run with the Superbikes as is the norm and those races wins were split between Yamalube/Westby Racing’s Joshua Day and RoadRace Factory’s Jake Gagne, both armed with Yamaha YZF-R1s. Day won race one in his return to U.S. road racing and Gagne, who crashed in race one, bounced back for the win in the second race. Day’s afternoon was a mirror image of Gagne’s as he crashed out of race two after winning race one.
Tyler O’Hara ended up second in both races on the Tyler O’Hara Racing Yamaha R1 with Taylor Knapp riding the FourFour Motorsports R1 to third in both races. Canada’s Marcel Irnie finished 10th in race one and ninth in race two out of 14 gridded riders on the only BMW S1000RR in the field.
The second Supersport race of the weekend featured the exact same podium as Saturday’s race, but in a different order. Yamalube/Graves Yamaha’s Garrett Gerloff dominated today’s race to become the third different Supersport winner in the three-race old season. Gerloff beat Saturday’s winner Josh Herrin by 8.630 seconds. Gerloff’s teammate JD Beach finished third for the second straight day on his Yamaha R6.
There was a strong Canadian presence in Supersport with Ben Young, current Canadian Pro Sport Bike champ Kenny Riedmann and rising teenage star Mitch Card all in attendance. Canadian-born US rider Javelin Broderick was also in the field. Young fared best, finishing eighth in race one and seventh in race two, a strong follow-up to his fourth place finish a week earlier in the rain in Texas. In race one Riedmann finished 11th, Broderick 13th and Card 14th. In race two Broderick took 10th, Riedmann was 13th and Card had a DNS.
Wheels In Motion/Meen Motorsports’ Joe Roberts won the Superstock 600 race for the second day in a row in Sunday afternoon’s final event, topping Kyle Wyman Racing’s Travis Wyman by 2.4 seconds. Wyatt Farris was third after finishing fourth in yesterday’s race.
SUPERBIKE RACE 1 1. Cameron Beaubier (Yamaha) 2. Josh Hayes (Yamaha) 3. Jake Lewis (Suzuki) 4. Bernat Martinez (Yamaha) 5. Chris Ulrich (Suzuki) 6. Elena Myers (Suzuki)
SUPERBIKE RACE 2 1. Cameron Beaubier (Yamaha) 2. Jake Lewis (Suzuki) 3. Bernat Martinez (Yamaha) 4. Chris Ulrich (Suzuki) 5. Stefano Mesa (Honda) 6. Elena Myers (Suzuki)
SUPERSTOCK 1000 RACE 1 1. Joshua Day (Yamaha) 2. Tyler O’Hara (Yamaha) 3. Taylor Knapp (Yamaha) 4. Mark Heckles (Yamaha) 5. Devon McDonough (Aprilia) 6. Brad Burns (Suzuki) 7. Shane Narbonne (Yamaha) 8. Dustin Dominguez (Aprilia) 9. Barrett Long (Ducati) 10. Marcel Irnie (Yamaha)
SUPERSTOCK 1000 RACE 2 1. Jake Gagne (Yamaha) 2. Tyler O’Hara (Yamaha) 3. Taylor Knapp (Yamaha) 4. Mark Heckles (Yamaha) 5. Dustin Dominguez (Aprilia) 6. Shane Narbonne (Yamaha) 7. Brad Burns (Suzuki) 8. Devon McDonough (Aprilia) 9. Marcel Irnie (BMW)
SUPERSPORT RACE 2 1. Garrett Gerloff (Yamaha) 2. Josh Herrin (Yamaha) 3. JD Beach (Yamaha) 4. Tomas Puerta (Yamaha) 5. David Anthony (Suzuki) 6. Cameron Petersen (Yamaha) 7. Ben Young (Yamaha) 8. Kyle Wyman (Yamaha) 9. Hayden Gillim (MV Agusta) 10. Javelin Broderick (Kawasaki)
SUPERSTOCK 600 RACE 2 1. Joe Roberts (Yamaha) 2. Travis Wyman (Yamaha) 3. Wyatt Farris (Yamaha) 4. Richie Escalante (Yamaha) 5. Andy DiBrino (Yamaha) 6. Nick McFadden (Suzuki) 7. Ryan Jones (Honda) 8. Bryce Prince (Yamaha) 9. Michael Gilbert (Yamaha) 10. Gavin Elstad (Yamaha)
— From MotoAmerica, with notes from Inside Motorcycles
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