Update:team Cycle World
UPDATE:TEAM CYCLE WORLD
ATTACK PERFORMANCE YOSHIMURA SUZUKI AMA PRO AMERICAN SUPERBIKE
ROUNDUP
CAMERON BEAUBIER WASN'T OUR FIRST choice to ride the Team Cycle World Attack Performance Yoshimura Suzuki AMA Pro American SuperBike. But when our initial pick, former Daytona 200 winner Steve Rapp, and later 2009 AMA Pro SuperSport Champion Leandro Mercado became unavailable, Beaubier went from on-deck to batter-up status—with the blessing of AMA Pro Racing.
Weeks after we shipped the June issue ("Team Cycle World Is Going Racing"), AMA Pro Racing changed its mind. Citing
Beaubier's lack of "big-bike" experience, officials denied the 17year-old's request for an American SuperBike license,
never mind that last year he was competing in the 125cc World Championship on a factory Red Bull KTM. Martin Cardenas, John Hopkins and Stevie Bonsey are the only other current AMA riders with Grand Prix experience.
AMA Pro Racing's sudden about-face frustrated everyone involved on this side of the project, including 1993 500cc World Champion Kevin Schwantz, on board to coach Beaubier in his SuperBike debut.
"Why not give a young kid the opportunity to show what he can do on a SuperBike?" asked the AMA Hall of Famer. "Throw him into the deep end; that's what would happen in any other series in any other part of the world."
Schwantz argued that he was only 20 years old with just one season of club roadracing under his belt in 1985
when he won both AMA Superbike races at Willow Springs International Raceway on a Yoshimura Suzuki GS700ES.
While it's true that Beaubier has little fourstroke experience, his podium performances this season at racetracks he's never before seen—including SuperSport wins at Daytona this past March and Infineon Raceway in May—speak for themselves. In its
own release describing April's SuperSport race at Road Atlanta, AMA Pro Racing stated, "J.D. Beach and his Rockwall Performance teammate Cameron Beaubier put on a display of skill and finesse.. .that was almost poetic in nature as they rode in perfect synchronization, banking left and right for each corner but all the while riding as if it [were] the last lap of qualifying."
Speaking of qualifying, Beaubier's best lap on his personal Yamaha YZF-R6 at Infineon would have put him 9th on the Daytona SportBike grid and 14th in American SuperBike—on treaded DOTapproved Dunlops. As we went to press, Beaubier was leading AMA Pro Racing SuperSport East points.
Unbeknownst to Cycle World, AMA
Pro Racing contacted several possible alternate riders, including Eric Bostrom, who had taken a self-imposed hiatus from racing and was living on a farm in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Bostrom was clearly excited by the prospect of racing a competitive machine in the series' top class, particularly at two of his favorite tracks: Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca and Virginia International Raceway. Bostrom has never won at Barber
Motorsports Park, the final stop for the series this season.
Laguna Seca will be Bostrom's first race on a "new-rules" AMA Pro American SuperBike. "The platform is what it is," he said. "What matters is the competition. And the only way you're going to have good competition is with a lot of good racers and a lot of good motorcycles. I absolutely think the series is now going in the right direction."
We'll soon find out if he's right.
—Matthew Miles
