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AMA Pro Superbike
AMA SBK: Yamaha Owns Thursday At DIS
Josh Hayes and Cameron Beaubier picked up where they left off in 2012, leading the way on the opening day of the 2013 AMA Pro Road Racing season.
Monster Energy Graves Yamaha's Josh Hayes (Photo: Evan Williams)
PROGRAMMING NOTE: The AMA Pro Superbike season opener will air on SPEED on Friday, March 15 at 6:00pm ET with Race 2 airing Sunday evening at 9:00pm. The Daytona 200 will air on SPEED at 1:30pm ET on Sunday, March 17. The Vance & Hines HD race and the twin SuperSport races will air LIVE on SPEED2.
The opening day of action for the 2013 GEICO Motorcycle AMA Pro Road Racing season brought renewed excitement in the form of fresh rider/team combinations, altered equipment and color schemes, and rejuvenated title hopes. However, while much did change over the offseason, the end result at the completion of the season's first AMA Pro National Guard SuperBike qualifying session at Daytona International Speedway proved very familiar.
Monster Energy Graves Yamaha's Josh Hayes delivered the field a sobering reminder of his unprecedented 2012 dominance with a similarly convincing Thursday performance. The reigning triple champion was immediately over a second quicker than the next faster rider and maintained that sort of advantage throughout the session.
Despite some determined late-session efforts from his key rivals, Hayes ended the session on provisional pole with 1.059 seconds in hand with a best time of 1:37.746.
In typically understated fashion Hayes said, "Everything went pretty smooth. It's a good first day for starting off a new season. I was feeling a bit of pressure about just getting things started. All the pressure and the hype of new people and new things coming in -- I've been kind of anxious to get on the racetrack and see how it all plays out. I think I left myself some pretty big shoes to fill last season.
"I didn't really focus too much on anybody else on the racetrack today; I just kind of did my own thing and then came in and saw how the leaderboard looked whenever I wasn't on the racetrack. Right now I just want to do my job. If I continue to do what I've been doing the last year or so, the pressure is on them to catch up to me. So far, so good. We'll see what happens from here."
Significant shuffling took place in the order behind Hayes during the session's final two minutes. When the dust had cleared, National Guard Jordan Suzuki's Roger Hayden was second (1:38.805), just fractionally quicker than Hayes' teammate, Josh Herrin (1:38.960), and Yoshimura Suzuki's new hope, Martin Cardenas (1:39.001).
Jordan Suzuki's Danny Eslick was impressive in his debut with the Michael Jordan Motorsports team, clocking the second fastest time in the opening practice and holding down that same spot during QP1 for a time before dropping a few spots late. He still walked away with fifth overall on Thursday, just three tenths off Hayden's runner-up mark at 1:39.121.
Foremost Insurance Pegram Racing Yamaha's Larry Pegram posted a similar pace in sixth (1:39.308), however his session ended with his new R1 tumbling over his head in a dramatic late-session crash.
No other rider was within two seconds of the provisional pole.
Yoshimura Suzuki's Chris Clark, Team Hero EBR's Geoff May, Motosport.com Motul Fly Racing's David Anthony, and May's Team AMSOIL/Hero-backed teammate, Aaron Yates, rounded out Thursday's top ten.
Should Hayes lock down the pole tomorrow morning, it will mark the 23rd of his SuperBike career, just one removed from three-time Ben Spies for second all-time.
The 15-lap 2013 AMA Pro National Guard SuperBike season opener will get underway tomorrow afternoon at 4:00p.m.
The opening day of action for the 2013 GEICO Motorcycle AMA Pro Road Racing season brought renewed excitement in the form of fresh rider/team combinations, altered equipment and color schemes, and rejuvenated title hopes. However, while much did change over the offseason, the end result at the completion of the season's first AMA Pro National Guard SuperBike qualifying session at Daytona International Speedway proved very familiar.
Monster Energy Graves Yamaha's Josh Hayes delivered the field a sobering reminder of his unprecedented 2012 dominance with a similarly convincing Thursday performance. The reigning triple champion was immediately over a second quicker than the next faster rider and maintained that sort of advantage throughout the session.
Despite some determined late-session efforts from his key rivals, Hayes ended the session on provisional pole with 1.059 seconds in hand with a best time of 1:37.746.
In typically understated fashion Hayes said, "Everything went pretty smooth. It's a good first day for starting off a new season. I was feeling a bit of pressure about just getting things started. All the pressure and the hype of new people and new things coming in -- I've been kind of anxious to get on the racetrack and see how it all plays out. I think I left myself some pretty big shoes to fill last season.
"I didn't really focus too much on anybody else on the racetrack today; I just kind of did my own thing and then came in and saw how the leaderboard looked whenever I wasn't on the racetrack. Right now I just want to do my job. If I continue to do what I've been doing the last year or so, the pressure is on them to catch up to me. So far, so good. We'll see what happens from here."
Significant shuffling took place in the order behind Hayes during the session's final two minutes. When the dust had cleared, National Guard Jordan Suzuki's Roger Hayden was second (1:38.805), just fractionally quicker than Hayes' teammate, Josh Herrin (1:38.960), and Yoshimura Suzuki's new hope, Martin Cardenas (1:39.001).
Jordan Suzuki's Danny Eslick was impressive in his debut with the Michael Jordan Motorsports team, clocking the second fastest time in the opening practice and holding down that same spot during QP1 for a time before dropping a few spots late. He still walked away with fifth overall on Thursday, just three tenths off Hayden's runner-up mark at 1:39.121.
Foremost Insurance Pegram Racing Yamaha's Larry Pegram posted a similar pace in sixth (1:39.308), however his session ended with his new R1 tumbling over his head in a dramatic late-session crash.
No other rider was within two seconds of the provisional pole.
Yoshimura Suzuki's Chris Clark, Team Hero EBR's Geoff May, Motosport.com Motul Fly Racing's David Anthony, and May's Team AMSOIL/Hero-backed teammate, Aaron Yates, rounded out Thursday's top ten.
Should Hayes lock down the pole tomorrow morning, it will mark the 23rd of his SuperBike career, just one removed from three-time Ben Spies for second all-time.
The 15-lap 2013 AMA Pro National Guard SuperBike season opener will get underway tomorrow afternoon at 4:00p.m.
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