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In recent years, there's been a recurring storyline in the MotoAmerica Medallia Superbike series: European rider with premier-class world championship race wins on his resume comes to the U.S. series to test the locals.
One rider found success (Toni Elias won the 2017 MotoAmerica title and settled permanently in California), one fizzled (World Superbike rider Loris Baz never won a MotoAmerica race), and one left in frustration after a year (Danilo Petrucci finished second last year and escaped to World Superbike).
For 2023, however, there's a very different storyline. It's not about newcomers. It's about homecomings. Four past champions will line up on the grid for the opening round at Road Atlanta this weekend and three of them were not in Superbike last year. Among them, these four have 10 AMA Superbike championships, winning every title since 2013 except for 2014. And they're not the only ones who could potentially win the 2023 title.
Return of champions, rise of challengers
The biggest question mark for 2023: How will five-time Superbike champion Cameron Beaubier fare in his return to the series? This time, he'll be riding a BMW M 1000 RR for the Tytlers Cycle Racing team instead of the Yamaha YZF-R1 he rode to his five titles. In 2020, Beaubier won his fifth MotoAmerica championship with a record-setting 16 wins in 20 races. He then left to race for the American Racing Team in the Moto2 world championship for the past two years.
Beaubier did not find the success he hoped for in the world championship. Despite taking pole position at his home race at Circuit of the Americas last year and running near the front a few times, he never stood on a Moto2 podium in two years of trying. Beaubier said — and is far from the first to say it — that the level of competition in Moto2 is high and the parity very close. There were also other reasons for his decision to return to MotoAmerica.
"As well as how intense it is on the track, I'm not gonna lie, part of my decision comes from getting homesick," Beaubier said. "I've been in Northern California my whole life, and it has been difficult spending significant amounts of time away from everything and everyone I know and love. I didn't realize how much I appreciated racing in the MotoAmerica series and that ability to be home after every race weekend."
Everyone expects Beaubier to be fast, but more questions surround the bike he's riding. Last year, P.J. Jacobsen put the Tytlers Cycle BMW on the podium three times and qualified on pole for the race at New Jersey Motorsports Park. But although Tytlers has assembled an experienced team, the BMW has yet to win a MotoAmerica Superbike race. The team will run three Superbikes in 2023, for Beaubier, Jacobsen, and 2022 Stock 1000 champion Corey Alexander. In a pre-season test session, Beaubier lapped within a second of the fastest lap time set by defending champion Jake Gagne.
Another intriguing returnee is Toni Elias, the man who interrupted Beaubier's run of championships. Elias was the original European interloper, arriving on the scene in 2016 as a replacement rider for Yoshimura Suzuki and making a splash by winning the first three races of the season, just as Petrucci did last year. It wasn't until the following year he won a championship, however, and after a frustrating 2020 season, he stepped away from racing full-time. He didn't lose his speed, however, as he proved in 2021 by making the podium in two of the six races he ran as a replacement rider.
In the surprise move of the off-season, Elias is returning to the Vision Wheel M4 ECSTAR Suzuki team he left in frustration after 2020. Elias, who just turned 40, will partner with Richie Escalante, a previous Supersport champion now entering his second year in the Superbike class.
The Suzuki team is grooming two rising young riders in the Supersport class, 17-year-old Tyler Scott and 20-year-old Teagg Hobbs. The deal with Elias looks like an arrangement to provide a veteran counterpart to the young Suzuki riders before Scott steps up to Superbike next year. But as Elias showed with his 2021 fill-in rides, that doesn't mean he won't be competitive for race wins.
Josh Herrin has had an even more lengthy and circuitous route back to Superbike. Since winning the championship in 2013, Herrin raced one year in Moto2, returned to MotoAmerica and raced in the Supersport, Superstock 1000, and Superbike classes, then last year dropped back down to Supersport, where he won the championship decisively on a Ducati Panigale V2, under the Next Generation Supersport rules, for the Warhorse HSBK Racing Ducati NYC team. Herrin, now 32, returns with the same team to race a Panigale V4 R in Superbike.
Of course all three of those returning champions will have to reckon with the man who has dominated the class the last two years. Jake Gagne took over where his former teammate Beaubier left off, breaking Beaubier's record with 17 race wins in 2021 and coming back from a slow start last year to pull away from Petrucci. Unlike the other three champions, Gagne is a proven combination with the motorcycle he's riding and the Fresh N Lean Progressive Yamaha Racing team run by Richard Stanboli that he rides for. Given the proven team behind him, his never-flustered and always-positive attitude, and the speed advantage he has shown over the rest of the field the last two years, Gagne has to be considered the favorite until someone proves otherwise.
In fact, Gagne's toughest competition might not be one of his fellow past champions, but his current teammate, Cameron Petersen. The South African rider has finished third in the championship points the last two years and has three race wins. In many ways, he's in the same position Gagne was in a few years ago: the new guy on arguably the strongest team in the paddock and paired with a teammate who is dominating. The difference is, Gagne isn't leaving like Beaubier did two years ago to make it easier on his junior teammate. If Petersen can step it up a notch, he will have to be considered a title contender.
Mathew Scholtz, who has been riding for the Oklahoma-based Westby Racing team full-time since 2017, has finished in the top five in the standings the last three years. The team has continued refining his Yamaha YZF-R1, with a focus on the electronics in recent years, and Scholtz sounds confident after pre-season testing.
"We have a really good understanding of the new electronics package, and I now feel like I can ride the bike in a manner that better suits my style," Scholtz said. "Our testing has opened up a new level of performance, and it's also increased my level of trust in the bike."
Other open questions include whether Jacobsen can take one more step forward and contest for wins on the BMW and whether Escalante will improve now that he has a full season of Superbike experience behind him. The answers start coming this weekend.
Pit stops come to Supersport and another attempt to break the record
I mentioned above that all the Superbike champions from 2013 to 2022 will be on the grid this year, except for the 2014 champ. It turns out there's a story there, too.
Josh Hayes won his fourth and final AMA Superbike title in 2014. Since he stopped racing full-time, Hayes has worked as a rider coach, he's filled in as a replacement rider, and helped out with the MP13 Racing team run by his wife, Melissa Paris. Along the way, he won three MotoAmerica Supersport races last year and that tied him with Miguel Duhamel at the top of the list of AMA roadracing victories across all classes, at 86.
Hayes, who turned 48 this month, was aiming at the record in last season's final round at Barber Motorsports Park, but a nasty highside in practice left him with a broken leg and a concussion and ended that quest. This year, he's once again riding in selected rounds with the Squid Hunter team, which is running a part-time effort in MotoAmerica.
As for the Supersport class itself, while there isn't a European invader in Superbike this year, there is one in Supersport. Xavi Forés, who has raced in World Superbike, MotoE Cup, and world endurance racing, among other series, is taking Herrin's championship-winning seat on the Panigale V2 at the Warhorse HSBK Racing Ducati NYC team. Like the other Europeans who came before him, he'll face the challenges of learning new tracks and racing on different tires, as well has having to fend off talented teenagers such as Scott.
There's also a notable name missing from the Supersport entries: Rocco Landers. Landers burst onto the scene in 2019, winning the Liqui Moly Junior Cup by winning 12 of 15 races and finishing 111 points ahead of second place. He won both Twins Cup and Junior Cup in 2020, finished fourth in Supersport in 2021 and second in Supersport in 2022. Despite that, his family-run team has not been able to put together funding for this year, leaving the 17-year-old on the sidelines.
The other big unknown in Supersport this year is the introduction of pit stops. Two races, at Barber in May and WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca in July, will be Supersport Extended Races and will include a mandatory pit stop that allows enough time to refuel the motorcycle and change the rear tire. Teams can choose not to change the tire, but they still have to make the pit stop for the minimum required time. Teams that have participated in the Daytona 200 since it switched to Supersport bikes will have experience with pit stops, but for other teams it adds an entirely new wrinkle.
While the action at Atlanta this weekend will be the first race for the Superbikes, Stock 1000, Junior Cup, and the first Supersport race that counts toward the MotoAmerica championship, the REV'IT Twins Cup, Mission King of the Baggers series, and Mission Super Hooligan National Championship all started with races in conjunction with the Daytona 200 last month. The King of the Baggers series, which started as a one-off race in 2020, will be a seven-round, 14-race series this year, while the Super Hooligan series also races at four MotoAmerica rounds. The Royal Enfield BUILD TRAIN RACE program returns and runs at four MotoAmerica weekends.
The Mission Mini Cup presented by Motul will consist of five doubleheader rounds for young racers on Ohvale race bikes and the top finishers qualify for the FIM World MiniGP in Spain.
All the races and practice sessions are shown live on MotoAmericaLive+, the paid streaming option that costs $109.99 for the season or $12.99 for one event. Entire races are generally posted for viewing on the MotoAmerica YouTube channel after the weekend.
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