Cameron Beaubier Scores His Second Win Of The Young MotoAmerica Season At Road Atlanta.
Tytlers Cycle Racing’s Cameron Beaubier turned in a masterful wet-weather riding performance in Saturday’s MotoAmerica Superbike race at Michelin Raceway Road Atlanta, with the five-time champion putting in the fastest two laps of the race on the final two laps to thwart the efforts of Attack Performance Progressive Yamaha Racing’s Jake Gagne.
The win was Beaubier’s 10th MotoAmerica Superbike win at Road Atlanta and the 67th Superbike win of his career. It was also his first wet-weather race win on the BMW M 1000 RR.
Beaubier led every bit of the race, but not without pressure. Gagne latched on to the back of Beaubier and didn’t let go, trailing the BMW for all 15 laps. Gagne and his Yamaha YZF-R1 were quicker on the first part of the 2.54-mile track, but Beaubier had him covered on the rest, making it difficult for Gagne to get close enough to attempt a pass.
Those two cleared off at the front, leaving Warhorse HSBK Racing Ducati’s Josh Herrin to finish third, some 12 seconds behind. Herrin rode mostly alone, but a mistake allowed Vision Wheel M4 ECSTAR Suzuki’s Sean Dylan Kelly to close in and almost beat the defending MotoAmerica Superbike Champion.
At the finish line it was Herrin by just .147 of a second over Kelly.
FLO4LAW/SBU Racing’s Benjamin Smith put in an impressive ride to a Superbike career best finish of fifth. Smith battled with and beat Vision Wheel M4 ECSTAR Suzuki’s Richie Escalante by 1.1 seconds.
The Real Steel Honda pairing of Hayden Gillim and JD Beach ended up seventh and eighth, respectively. Aftercare Scheibe Racing’s Danilo Lewis and Jones Honda’s Ashton Yates rounded out the top 10.
Attack Performance Progressive Yamaha Racing’s Bobby Fong ended up 11th after crashing out of third place and remounting to score five valuable points.
The top four finishers were mounted on four different makes of motorcycle: BMW, Yamaha, Ducati, and Suzuki.
After three races in the 2025 MotoAmerica Superbike Championship, Beaubier leads Jake Gagne by nine points, 70-61. Herrin is third, 27 points behind Beaubier and four points ahead of Kelly. Fong rounds out the top five in the title chase, three points adrift of Kelly.
Beach, meanwhile, keeps his unbeaten streak alive in the MotoAmerica Superbike Cup, with three wins on his Stock 1000-spec Honda CBR1000 RR Fireblade SP.
The second of two Superbike races at Road Atlanta will take place on Sunday at 3:12 p.m.
Superbike Race 1
- Cameron Beaubier (BMW)
- Jake Gagne (Yamaha)
- Josh Herrin (Ducati)
- Sean Dylan Kelly (Suzuki)
- Benjamin Smith (Yamaha)
- Richie Escalante (Suzuki)
- Hayden Gillim (Honda)
- JD Beach (Honda)
- Danilo Lewis (BMW)
- Ashton Yates (Honda)
Quotes…
Cameron Beaubier – Winner
“I was just trying to stay focused on every part of the track. Like Jake (Gagne) said, there are some corners out there that will just catch you. You feel like you’ll go through the same as you did the lap before, and your front tire will push right out from under you. Down into turn three, I knifed the front a couple times in the sighting lap session and also in the race. Then, where I fell over in the sighting lap session, there a couple times I had the front kind of push around a little bit. So, I definitely had my spots where I felt like I could roll around pretty good, and then other spots where I had to be really careful. I saw zero on my board, and then I started looking at Jake’s pit board. I saw our gap growing and I felt pretty comfortable at that pace. I knew Jake wasn’t going anywhere. So, I didn’t try to ride over my head. I just tried to stay in my lane. I figured something happened towards the end, but I felt like just with how sketchy the track is, it would be pretty tough to make any passes. I feel like we could hardly go any faster than we were going. I’m stoked just to get a good rain race under my belt on this bike, a good win. This is my first rain race win on the BMW. We’ve had some tough days on this thing in the wet, so that felt really good to feel good on the bike.”
Jake Gagne – Second Place
“He was getting really good drives. He was using the rear tire, and I was kind of using the front tire. So, any opportunity of getting close enough to try to make a pass was tough. I’m glad. Coming into this, a rain race here is a lot different than Barber. Just surviving out here is priority number one. To me, this is the sketchiest track to ride in the rain probably all year. There’s some really tricky stuff. You’ve got to know where there’s some slick spots. It’s really, really tricky. It’s not like Barber with super consistent grip. So, I’m just glad I kept her up on two. Cam (Beaubier) was hauling and ran away from the beginning. I was pretty impressed with how hard he was going straight off the bat. I kind of was just rolling around behind him. Couldn’t do anything about it. Then that last lap he was able to put on a charge and I couldn’t stay there. Good to get another podium. Tomorrow we’ve got a dry race, so looking forward to that.”
Josh Herrin – Third Place
“It was kind of stressful. I went out for the warm-up and the feeling I got from the bike was exactly the same as I had the last two years. So, I was panicking, and then we made a big change. It was 90 percent to where it was at Barber, so the guys did a quick change and it helped me out a lot. The mistake, I think for a lap or two I just started riding super tense because I went from a two-and-a-half second gap to now he (Sean Dylan Kelly) was right there. I think I almost high-sided in five. It was the first time I had the rear come around. It was pretty big. So, he caught me. I think that was on the last lap. So, I had tried to build up a little gap in the esses and stuff. I don’t know if I had one, but if I did it was gone after that. He got me going in 10A. He ran it pretty wide, so I thought he was going to try to just park it in 10B, just to make sure I didn’t cut it underneath him. But he ran the regular line. I was telling myself, if he didn’t protect the line at the top then I was going to try to get him there. He left a couple feet there and I was able to just stab back underneath him. Then he released the brakes. So, we had one of those grab brake, release brake, grab brake, release brake. Probably three times, I think. I knew there was a big gap behind him, so I was prepared to just keep going until it was the last second. So, it worked out. I’m glad. It was just a cool little battle on the last lap. Hopefully, it provided some entertainment for everybody out there that stuck it out in the rain. I’m just happy, like I said on the podium, to be up here. We’ve had such a hard time in the rain the last two years on this bike. It seems like we’ve figured something out. Today I think we lost nine points. Last year, we would have lost 25 points because we weren’t scoring points, really. So, I’m super happy with that step. Hopefully tomorrow we can have a good day, too.”
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