Rockstar Makita Suzuki’s Mat Mladin continues to lead the AMA Superbike championship after finishing second in Sunday afternoon’s race at Road America in Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin.
Sunday’s race was the second of two in the AMA Suzuki Superbike Doubleheader weekend, which saw six-time AMA Superbike Champion Mladin winning the first race of the event on Saturday.
So far this year, Mladin has won nine AMA Superbike races and finished on the podium a total of 10 out of 11 times. Jordan Suzuki’s Aaron Yates joined Mladin on the podium in third place after passing Mladin’s Rockstar Makita Suzuki team mate Blake Young, who ran in third for most of the 13-lap event.
After Yates’ pass, Young fell and wound up finishing eighth. Finally, Rockstar Makita Suzuki’s Tommy Hayden finished up the weekend with a seventh-place result.
Mat Mladin:
“Obviously, it was a race with a lot of back and forth for the lead and in the end, we couldn’t get it done. We rode hard on the Rockstar Makita Suzuki GSX-R1000 and that’s all we could do today.”
Tommy Hayden:
“I got a better start today and it was good to have a dry race. We’ve been struggling a bit all weekend, though it was definitely a better race today than yesterday. I did my fastest times all weekend in that race. But I’ve had a tough time this weekend and I feel like I’ve really had to work hard for every little bit of progress we made on the track. But we’ve got to keep on working on the bike and get back to where we need to be.”
Blake Young:
“I got off to a really good start on my Rockstar Makita Suzuki GSX-R1000 and was running fourth for a little while. And I just kind sorted out the field and ended up in third for a little bit. I tried to keep my head down and watch the guys in front of me battling it out, and hoping they would make a mistake and I could get a little closer. But we ended up eighth and now we’ll go to our next test and work on the bike from there.”
Aaron Yates:
“We had a pretty decent race there. The start didn’t go as good as I’d have wanted… it looked like it was going to be a tough one. But I managed to get by some folks on the Jordan Suzuki GSX-R1000 and put in some good laps. We made some changes to the bike last night and this morning, and I was able to go out there and ride like I needed to go fast so thanks to the Jordan Suzuki crew for that. I was pushing as hard as I could and was able to ride hard to the end. It feels good to get up on the podium for the Jordan Suzuki team.”
AMA Superbike Top 10 Finishers:
1. Larry Pegram (Ducati)
2. Mat Mladin (Rockstar Makita Suzuki)
3. Aaron Yates (Jordan Suzuki)
4. Geoff May (National Guard Jordan Suzuki)
5. Ben Bostrom (Yamaha)
6. Neil Hodgson (Honda)
7. Tommy Hayden (Rockstar Makita Suzuki)
8. Blake Young (Rockstar Makita Suzuki)
9. Jake Holden (Honda)
10. David Anthony (Suzuki)
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