PHOTOGRAPHY BY ANDREA WILSON
MONTEREY, CA, JULY 20 – By virtue of his best lap from yesterday afternoon’s qualifying session, Y.E.S. Graves Yamaha’s Cameron Beaubier will start tomorrow’s Daytona SportBike race from pole position after a foggy second qualifying session at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca this morning proved fruitless for most of the top riders.
Beaubier’s track record setting 1:26.698 from yesterday stands as the only lap in the 1:26s.
“We made a couple of changes for this morning on the rear shock,” Beaubier said. “It helped a little bit. I was a little timid in the beginning with all the fog and stuff, but I saw Garett [Gerloff] going fast at the end so we put a soft tire in and tried to better my lap time, but I think I was a couple of tenths off or so. I felt good this morning. We’re still dialing in the bike a little bit and will try it again in warm-up. For right now, I think we’re looking good for the race.”
The one rider who did make an improvement was Beaubier’s teammate Garrett Gerloff, the 17 year old improving from yesterday to move to second behind his teammate on what will be a three-rider front row for tomorrow’s final.
“We showed up here and the bike was really good for me and we didn’t really change anything yesterday,” Gerloff said. “Every time I go out I figure something out and get more comfortable with the track. I feel really good for the race tomorrow and hopefully I can drop some more time because we’re going to need it to keep up with Cameron.”
Roadracing Factory’s Jake Gagne was the rider that Gerloff bumped down to third, but Gagne will still start the race from the front row.
Heading row two is the first non-Yamaha in the field – the Latus Motorsports Triumph ridden by Jason DiSalvo.
Daytona SportBike Qualifying
1. Cameron Beaubier (Yamaha) 1:26.698
2. Garrett Gerloff (Yamaha) 1:27.524
3. Jake Gagne (Yamaha) 1:27.769
4. Jason DiSalvo (Triumph) 1:28.157
5. Jake Lewis (Yamaha) 1:28.641
6. JD Beach (Yamaha) 1:28.650
7. Dane Westby (Honda) 1:28.681
8. Bobby Fong (Triumph) 1:28.684
9. James Rispoli (Suzuki) 1:28.773
10. Joey Pascarella (Triumph) 1:29.205
