ROAD RACE
ROUND 1 / CIRCUIT OF THE AMERICAS
AUSTIN, TEXAS / APRIL 10, 2016
P70
Supersport
Garrett Gerloff started the Mo-
toAmerica Supersport season in
stellar style, taking a resounding
victory over his Yamaha Extend-
ed Services/Graves teammate
and reigning Supersport cham-
pion, JD Beach at Circuit of the
Americas today.
Gerloff qualified on the pole
for the only Supersport class
race of the weekend on the
undercard to the Red Bull Grand
Prix of the Americas, missing
out on the holeshot to Beach
before taking a lead a couple of
laps later which he would never
relinquish.
"The track was a little greasy
today, not sure if that was due to
the grand prix guys or not but it
was really hard to keep the bike
in line," said Gerloff. "Still, I was
able to do smooth and consis-
tent laps and get the win at my
home track, so I couldn't be
happier."
Beach lamented a wrong tire
selection that he'd hoped would
give him a little extra grip in the
last third of the race. Instead
it did the opposite, as Gerloff
pulled away inch by inch to be
one second clear at the flag.
"We took a gamble with the tire
and it definitely didn't work but
that's the decision I made," said
the reigning champ. "We learned
a lot and I improved my riding,
plus we have a long season to go
so I'm looking forward to it."
Third went to MotoAmerica
rookie Valentine Debise, the
former Moto2 rider putting his
M4 Sportbike Trackgear.com
Suzuki on the podium in his first
visit to COTA.
"I wasn't expecting to do
the podium," said a delighted
Debise. "The end of the race
was a bit difficult with tires slid-
ing a lot, but I got there to the
podium, so job done. I wasn't
surprised with the tire perfor-
mance, we have had some prob-
lems with it when testing and
three laps before the end it was
sliding a lot, but we got there in
the end."
Rounding out the top five was
2015 MotoAmerica Superstock
600 Champion Joe Roberts
(Wheels in Motion/Meen Mo-
torsport.com Yamaha YZF-R6)
in his return to the Supersport
ranks, the youngster coming out
top of a Californian battle with
Team H35 Honda CBR600RR
rider Benny Solice. CN
M O T O A M E R I C A A M A / F I M N O R T H A M E R I C A N R O A D R A C I N G C H A M P I O N S H I P
Garrett Gerloff topped Saturday's Supersport race.
