Henny Ray Abrams | May 14, 2011
SONOMA, CA, MAY 14 –
Bruce Rossmeyer Daytona Harley-Davidson’s Chris Fillmore won his first AMA professional road race in the red flag-interrupted AMA Pro Vance & Hines XR1200 Series final at the end of a day of racing at Infineon Raceway.Drag Specialties/Vance & Hines Michael Barnes was in front of pole-setter Fillmore when the race was stopped on the sixth of 11 laps after Gerry Signorelli highsided exiting turn 11, his Kuryakyn/Bob Fier Racing XR1200 coming to rest on the racing line on the front straight. Steve Rapp was then in third.Rapp took himself out of contention for the win by jumping the gun on the re-start. He was assessed a five-second penalty on the second lap of the six remaining. Though third on the track, he was actually in 10th, but not for long.
Rapp quickly cut through the field and on the fourth lap he was up to fourth and soon to pass Tyler O’Hara, who he was faster than by 2.4 seconds a lap.Once he passed O’Hara, Rapp was too far down on Barnes to be a threat and had to settle for third.Fillmore won by 3.586 over Barnes, with Rapp another 3.736 further back.O’Hara was fourth under pressure from Vance & Hines/J&P Cycles’ Michael Beck, who finished fifth.The win gave Fillmore the championship points lead. After two of eight races, Fillmore leads Rapp 57 to 40.
XR1200 Results:
1. Chris Fillmore
2. Michael Barnes
3. Steve Rapp
4. Tyler O’Hara
5. Michael Beck
6. Michael Corbino
7. Chris McFarland
8. Bradley Adams
9. Joe Kopp
10. Jake Chisum
Henny Ray Abrams | Contributing Editor
Abrams is the longest-serving contributor at Cycle News. Over the course of his 35-some years of writing and shooting photos, he’s covered events from MotoGP to the Motocross World Championship - and everything in between.
