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AMA Pro Superbike
AMA SBK: Hayes Claims First New Lap Record Of Modern Era
Josh Hayes finally did away with one of the old lap records established during the 'Real Superbike' era of Mat Mladin and Ben Spies today at Road America.
Monster Energy Graves Yamaha's Josh Hayes (Photo: Evan Williams)
PROGRAMMING NOTE: The AMA Pro Road Racing action from Road America will air on SPEED at 11:00pm ET on Saturday, June 3rd and Sunday, June 4th.
Another AMA Pro Road Racing weekend, another AMA Pro Superbike pole position for Josh Hayes. While each successive pole position for Hayes feels like that much more of a non-story, his fifth in five 2012 attempts may stand as his most notable yet.
Hayes ripped off a 2:11.333 on Saturday morning at Road America and for the first time since the current more-restricted class format was established a few years back, an old 'Real Superbike' lap record was bettered. Hayes' mark dipped under the 2007 QP mark of Superbike legend Mat Mladin (2:11.541) to set the new standard at the 4.05-mile road course.
Hayes boasted a mammoth 1.575-second gap in qualifying over second-placed Blake Young on the Yoshimura Racing Suzuki GSX-R1000. To put that in perspective, the gap separating second from ninth was only 1.245 seconds.
The pole is the 17th of the Monster Energy Graves Yamaha pilot's career in the premier class, tying him with Freddie Spencer for fourth on the all-time order.
Commenting on scoring the first lap record of the modern era, Hayes said "It's pretty cool. It's a good show of how far the technology has come in a few years now that we're on closer to a Superstock-spec machine. And Dunlop is still giving us good rubber and we're able to chip away at that. I guess you wouldn't think this would be the track where something like that would happen, but then again, with just the hard braking and stuff like that, maybe it is the kind of track where it would work out.
I'm happy with how things are going and it's really cool to get that. But my primary thing is to try to make sure I can stay out front and try to beat these boys."
Meanwhile, home track favorite and title hopeful Young has a big job ahead of him to find the face to defeat Hayes and stop the bleeding.
The championship leaders will be joined on the front row by MMP runner-up Josh Herrin on the second Monster Energy Graves Yamaha YZF-R1 and Jordan Suzuki's Ben Bostrom.
National Guard Jordan Suzuki's Roger Hayden suffered another fall after his bumpy Miller outing but still held onto fifth. The second row will be rounded out by Team Amsoil/Hero's Geoff May, Attack Performance's Steve Rapp, and Foremost Insurance Pegram Racing's Larry Pegram.
Today's 13-lap Superbike race will get underway at 3:15pm local time.
SPEED.com Motorcycle Racing Editor Chris Martin saw Eddie Lawson win aboard a Kawasaki the first time he attended an AMA Superbike race and witnessed Ben Bostrom win a World Superbike race aboard a V&H Ducati the first time he worked one. He has written about AMA SBK, WSBK, and MotoGP for SPEED.com since 2003. Chris is now on Twitter.
Another AMA Pro Road Racing weekend, another AMA Pro Superbike pole position for Josh Hayes. While each successive pole position for Hayes feels like that much more of a non-story, his fifth in five 2012 attempts may stand as his most notable yet.
Hayes ripped off a 2:11.333 on Saturday morning at Road America and for the first time since the current more-restricted class format was established a few years back, an old 'Real Superbike' lap record was bettered. Hayes' mark dipped under the 2007 QP mark of Superbike legend Mat Mladin (2:11.541) to set the new standard at the 4.05-mile road course.
Hayes boasted a mammoth 1.575-second gap in qualifying over second-placed Blake Young on the Yoshimura Racing Suzuki GSX-R1000. To put that in perspective, the gap separating second from ninth was only 1.245 seconds.
The pole is the 17th of the Monster Energy Graves Yamaha pilot's career in the premier class, tying him with Freddie Spencer for fourth on the all-time order.
Commenting on scoring the first lap record of the modern era, Hayes said "It's pretty cool. It's a good show of how far the technology has come in a few years now that we're on closer to a Superstock-spec machine. And Dunlop is still giving us good rubber and we're able to chip away at that. I guess you wouldn't think this would be the track where something like that would happen, but then again, with just the hard braking and stuff like that, maybe it is the kind of track where it would work out.
I'm happy with how things are going and it's really cool to get that. But my primary thing is to try to make sure I can stay out front and try to beat these boys."
Meanwhile, home track favorite and title hopeful Young has a big job ahead of him to find the face to defeat Hayes and stop the bleeding.
The championship leaders will be joined on the front row by MMP runner-up Josh Herrin on the second Monster Energy Graves Yamaha YZF-R1 and Jordan Suzuki's Ben Bostrom.
National Guard Jordan Suzuki's Roger Hayden suffered another fall after his bumpy Miller outing but still held onto fifth. The second row will be rounded out by Team Amsoil/Hero's Geoff May, Attack Performance's Steve Rapp, and Foremost Insurance Pegram Racing's Larry Pegram.
Today's 13-lap Superbike race will get underway at 3:15pm local time.
SPEED.com Motorcycle Racing Editor Chris Martin saw Eddie Lawson win aboard a Kawasaki the first time he attended an AMA Superbike race and witnessed Ben Bostrom win a World Superbike race aboard a V&H Ducati the first time he worked one. He has written about AMA SBK, WSBK, and MotoGP for SPEED.com since 2003. Chris is now on Twitter.
AMA SBK Miller Motorsports Park
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