PHOTOGRAPHY BY BRIAN J NELSON
AUSTIN, TX, APRIL 11 – Yamalube Y.E.S. Graves Yamaha’s JD Beach put his name down in the record books as the first Supersport winner in the MotoAmerica FIM/AMA North American Road Racing Championship. The victory today at the Circuit of Americas was also a personal milestone for Beach—his first win in the class (equivalent to the Daytona Sportbike class in the former AMA Championship). It also marked an end to Beach’s five-year win drought.
The win didn’t come easy either. The threat of rain that had held off all day for the MotoGP World Championship arrived just in time for the start of the Supersport race, giving the middleweight class mixed-track conditions to try and navigate through.
JD Beach got the holeshot, but it didn’t take the former AMA Superbike Champion Josh Herrin on the Wheels In Motion Motorsport.com Meen Yamaha to take the lead. Also in the mix in that lead group was Beach’s teammate Garrett Gerloff and Latus Motors Racing’s Bobby Fong, with each of the foursome having their turn in the lead.
Eventually Malaysian Ramdan Rosli on a Kyle Wyman Racing prepped Yamaha, got into the mix, but unfortunately got caught out in the conditions and crashed in the final corner before the halfway mark. Shortly after, Road Racing Factory Yamaha’s Cameron Petersen crashed out of fourth in turn one.
So it was back to the four—Herrin, Fong, Gerloff and Beach, with Herrin and Fong battling for the top honors. That was until all hell broke loose.
The rain really started coming down at around four laps to go. Herrin eventually made a mistake that allowed Fong to slip by and Beach past the pair of them to take the lead. It then went from bad to worse for Herrin as he crashed out of a podium position with two laps remaining; teammate Joe Roberts followed suit a moment later.
Fong would also get caught out by the tough conditions and crashed on the final lap.
With all of the fall out it was a nail-biter until the end, but Beach held on the win, Gerloff held on to take second and M4 Suzuki’s David Anthony to third.
In the post race press conference, Beach dedicated the race win to the Westby family who recently lost longtime AMA racer Dane Westby to a streetbike accident in the family’s hometown of Tulsa, Oklahoma.
Petersen’s teammate Ben Young finished fourth ahead of Kaleb De Keyrel on a privateer Yamaha. The Meen Yamaha duo—Roberts and Herrin—were able to rejoin the race, finishing sixth and seventh, respectively.
Kyle Wyman finished eighth on his self-ran Yamaha effort. Fong also was able to recover from his crash and finish the race in ninth, as did Malaysian Rosli who finished 10.
2015 MotoAmerica
Circuit of The Americas
Supersport Results:
1. JD Beach (Yamaha)
2. Garrett Gerloff (Yamaha)
3. David Anthony (Suzuki)
4. Ben Young (Yamaha)
5. Kaleb De Keyrel (Yamaha)
6. Joe Roberts (Yamaha)
7. Josh Herrin (Yamaha)
8. Kyle Wyman (Yamaha)
9. Bobby Fong (Triumph)
10. Ramdan Rosli (Yamaha)
