Bostrom Wins Daytona SportBike

Paul Carruthers | July 5, 2009

Graves Motorsports Yamaha’s Ben Bostrom survived a red flag and the constant pressure of Aprilia USA’s Chaz Davies to win the Daytona SportBike round at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca today.Bostrom, who hasn’t ridden in the class since winning the Daytona 200 on the Yamaha R6 back in March, made the most of his opportunity to race at Laguna Seca as he rode to a .225-of-a-second victory over Davies after a highly entertaining race held after the Red Bull U.S. Grand Prix.For Bostrom it was win number two in two starts this season and for Davies it was by far his best effort of the year on the upstart Aprilia.Third place today went to Bostrom’s teammate Josh Herrin. The youngster was with Bostrom in the battle for the lead in the first portion of the race, but after the red flag he couldn’t keep pace after getting rammed on at least two occasions as he was caught up in the melee behind. He was 6.2 seconds behind the leader at the end and just half a second ahead of yet another Yamaha teammster, Tommy Aquino. Roberto Pietri was a shadow fifth on his Venemotos-backed Yamaha R6.Championship points leader and pole sitter Martin Cardenas crashed out of the race on the sixth lap in turn 10, and his M4 Suzuki teammate Jason DiSalvo brought out the red flag four laps later when he crashed in the Corksrew and both Ricky Parker and Chris Filmore crashed while trying to avoid the sliding Suzuki and its rider.After a delay of 27 minutes, the race was restarted behind the pace car and the battle between Bostrom and Davies ensued. Originally, the pack was together at the front but it broke up somewhat – especially when Yamaha’s Josh Hayes ran into the back of Herrin entering the Corkscrew and crashed.Erion Honda’s Jake Zemke was catching the lead duo in the closing laps, but his Honda failed him on the start of the final lap and he rolled to a stop in turn two.

Daytona SportBike

1.                  Ben Bostrom (Yamaha)

2.                  Chaz Davies (Aprilia)

3.                  Josh Herrin (Yamaha)

4.                  Tommy Aquino (Yamaha)

5.                  Roberto Pietri (Yamaha)

Paul Carruthers | Editor

Paul Carruthers took over as the editor of Cycle News in 1993 after serving as associate editor since starting his career at the publication in 1985. Carruthers has covered every facet of the sport in his near-28-year tenure at America's Daily Motorcycle News Source.