Photography by Brian J. Nelson
BIRMINGHAM, AL (June 13, 2015) – Cameron Beaubier looks to be putting the issues he had at Barber Motorsports Park last year behind him. He bounced back with a strong MotoAmerica Superpole qualifying performance Saturday. Beaubier railed around the Barber circuit on his factory Monster Energy Yamaha R1 Superbike in a time of 1:25.599 to win the pole, his second of the season. Yoshimura Suzuki’s Roger Hayden and defending series champ Josh Hayes will join Beaubier on the front row in Sunday’s races.
“I felt really good so far this weekend on the R1,” said Beaubier, who earned his fourth-career Superbike pole. “I struggled here really bad last year with two crashes and it was a pretty frustrating weekend. To come back here this weekend and have a good Friday practice and good qualifying and practice today, it gives me a little bit more confidence going into tomorrow. I’m looking forward to it. It’s going to be a tough day tomorrow. I’m just going to try to put together some solid laps. These guys are ripping so it’s going to make for an interesting and really tough two races.”
Fairly early in the session Jake Gagne was forced to pull off the track when his RoadRace Factory Yamaha began bellowing or smoke. That brought out the red flag to make sure the fluids on the racing surface were cleaned up. The oil dry left behind slowed times and got into the helmets of riders who were unfortunate to be behind others as they went through the section. Hayes was one who said he was caught behind others, got dusted up, and was surprised by the amount of oil dry spread across the track.
Yet for Beaubier the dust from the oil dry was simply a minor distraction.
“The oil cleanup I feel like it could have a couple of tenths slower a lap going into there,” Beaubier said. “because you had to hold a tighter line going in, but it wasn’t too bad – it was the same for everyone.”
Maybe the surprise of the session was the performance of South African Sheridan Morais who qualified fourth (first Superstock 1000) on the Aprilia RSV4RR. He nudged out factory Suzuki’s Jake Lewis who rounded out the top five.
MotoAmerica Superbike Superpole from Barber Motorsports Park – June 13, 2015
1 6 Cameron Beaubier Yamaha YZF-R1 01:25.599
2 95 Roger Hayden Suzuki GSX-R1000 01:26.054
3 1 Josh Hayes Yamaha YZF-R1 01:26.159
4 86 Sheridan Morais Aprilia RSV4RR 01:26.216
5 85 Jake Lewis Suzuki GSX-R1000 01:26.469
6 32 Jake Gagne Yamaha YZF-R1 01:26.849
7 44 Taylor Knapp Yamaha YZF-R1 01:26.950
8 69 Danny Eslick Honda CBR1000RR 01:27.527
9 00 Joshua Day Yamaha YZF-R1 01:27.708
10 18 Chris Ulrich Suzuki GSX-R1000 01:28.055
11 11 Chris Fillmore KTM RC8 01:28.118
12 19 Tyler O’Hara Yamaha YZF-R1 01:29.037
