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When the field lines up for the opening race of the MotoAmerica HONOS Superbike Series this weekend at Michelin Raceway Road Atlanta, the combined total of AMA Superbike championships represented will be one. And that one was Josh Herrin's title eight years ago. In other words, it's a wide open season.
For the first time in several years, there won't be one or two heavy favorites. The riders who have won every championship since Herrin's one title are all gone. Four-time champion Josh Hayes retired after the 2017 season, 2017 champion Toni Elias is without a ride this year and effectively retired from racing, and five-time champion Cameron Beaubier left to test himself in the Moto2 world championship.
Instead of the usual suspects, the title contenders are a combination of newcomers from abroad, young riders aiming for their breakthrough year, and the one former champion in the field.
Young racers rising and the Euro invasion
After finishing first and second in its first season running Yamaha's Superbike effort, the Fresh N' Lean Attack Performance Yamaha team has to be considered the favorite. Jake Gagne, who finished second behind Beaubier last year, and Herrin, who replaces Beaubier, both have experience working with Richard Stanboli's team and plenty of seat time on the Yamaha YZF-R1.
Last year's third-place finisher, Bobby Fong, returns to the M4 ECSTAR Suzuki team for a second season in Superbike. He's joined by new teammate Cameron Petersen, who steps up after winning the Stock 1000 class last year.
Mathew Scholtz and the Westby Racing Team finished second in six races last year and looked strong at the Dunlop Preseason Test at the Circuit of the Americas in March. Kyle Wyman returns for a third year on his self-run KWR Ducati Racing team, campaigning a Ducati Panigale V4 R.
But it's another Ducati that is the biggest unknown and the rider-team combination getting the most attention. French rider Loris Baz, who finished eighth last year in World Superbike and also has MotoGP and British Superbike experience, has joined the Warhorse HSBK Racing Ducati New York team and will race a Panigale V4 R in MotoAmerica. Despite his good showing last year, Baz found himself without a WSBK ride in 2021, and he sees the MotoAmerica ride as an opportunity to get back where he belongs.
"I was not looking for something to end my career," Baz said in a recent MotoAmerica podcast. "I'm only 28 and I was trying everything to stay in World Superbike but I say, if I have to go somewhere else, I will only go if it can be a jump to come back in World Superbike, maybe in a better position than I was. I'm sure if we bring the title back to Ducati... I will get another go in World Superbike. So that is the target."
The team has support from Ducati Corse. Eraldo Ferracci, who last led Ducati to an AMA Superbike title 27 years ago, is back as team manager. The team proved itself last year with a win at Indianapolis and six podium finishes in six races with Ducati test rider Lorenzo Zanetti, so the potential is clear. In 2016, former Moto2 world champion Toni Elias came to MotoAmerica from Europe and immediately made a huge impact, winning races from the start and taking the 2017 championship. Will Baz be the second European to come to American and make an instant imprint?
Even more unexpected than Baz's arrival was the last signing of the preseason and the other half of the 2021 European invasion. With all the other seats filled, the last question mark this spring was who would ride the Schiebe Racing BMW S 1000 RR. The surprise choice was 34-year-old Héctor Barberá, a former MotoGP and World Superbike racer. Barberá was not signed in time to test the bike at the preseason test, so the Spanish rider will be new to the team, the motorcycle, the series and the track when he arrives at Road Atlanta.
At the preseason test, Fong, Baz, Gagne and Scholtz all lapped COTA under 2:09. With the past champions gone, young riders rising and new riders entering the mix, there are half a dozen potential 2021 MotoAmerica HONOS Superbike champions, making this the hardest season in several years to predict. Should make for interesting racing.
Supersport: Grudge match, round two
If the Superbike podium is destined to look very different this year, it will be a huge shock if the front of the Supersport field does not look very familiar. Last year, two riders were consistently at the front of the field: 2020 champion Richie Escalante on the HONOS Racing team won 13 of 18 races and Sean Dylan Kelly of the M4 ECSTAR Suzuki team won the other five and finished second 10 times. The only rider who regularly harried those two frontrunners was Brandon Paasch of Celtic HSBK Racing. For 2021, Escalante and Kelly are back for another round, while Paasch has returned to the U.K. to race in the British Superport Championship (where he will race a Triumph Street Triple 765 RS as part of that series' experiment in expanding the motorcycles allowed in Supersport). Paasch left the United States on a high note, pulling off a perfect, last-lap drafting pass to beat Kelly to the finish line at the Daytona 200 last month by 0.03 seconds.
While it's possible that another young rider can make a step forward in 2021 and challenge those two heavy favorites for the MotoAmerica title, it will have to be a big step to catch up to Escalante and Kelly.
Escalante had hoped to move up to the Superbike class this year but his biggest priority was staying with his HONOS Racing team, a group where the Mexican rider feels very much at home. Plans for a HONOS Superbike team did not materialize, so he will be back to defend his Supersport title on his Kawasaki ZX-6R. Kelly is also back with the same team on his Suzuki GSX-R600.
The competition turned tense last year as Kelly and his team insinuated that the Kawasaki's extra 37 cc of displacement gave Escalante an unfair advantage. Defenders of Escalante pointed out that other racers had tried to compete on the Ninja without notable success and said the difference clearly was the rider. Escalante tried to stay unruffled by the insinuation and Kelly usually prefaced his remarks by saying "I'm not taking anything away from Richie," but the result was still noticeable frostiness between the two. And they spent a lot of time together on podiums and in post-race press conferences.
For 2021, MotoAmerica added 9.6 pounds of weight to the ZX-6R but I don't expect that to slow down Escalante much — and neither does he. In a recent MotoAmerica podcast, Escalante said the additional weight might actually help the handling of the bike, since the team has the option of placing it wherever they want. He's certainly off to a strong start. At the preseason test, Escalante set the fastest time in all eight Supersport sessions.
One rider who will be interesting to watch in Supersport is 16-year-old rising star Rocco Landers, who has won three championships in his two seasons in MotoAmerica, dominating Liqui Moly Junior Cup in 2019 and winning both Junior Cup and Twins Cup in 2020. Landers will race a Yamaha YZF-R6 in Supersport this year, which should be a significantly bigger challenge.
Baggers, Twins, Juniors
Maybe surprisingly, the most popular MotoAmerica class, in terms of entries, is Stock 1000, as liter sport bikes become the most common race platform, instead of 600 cc supersports. In addition to the Stock 1000 title, riders also run in the HONOS Superbike races, competing for the Superbike Cup, a prize based on their results in the Superbike races.
Last year's inaugural King of the Baggers Invitational race, if viewed strictly as a competitive event, was a bit of a snooze. But in terms of what it was meant to be — a spectacle — it was a huge success, garnering attention far beyond a lot of the more serious MotoAmerica racing. For 2021, King of the Baggers is back for three rounds, including this weekend at Road Atlanta. One new entry this year will be Kyle Wyman, who will split the weekend between riding his Ducati Superbike and riding the Harley-Davidson Screamin’ Eagle Factory Road Glide Special.
With Landers moving on to Supersport, both Junior Cup and Twins Cup will have new champions this year. In Twins Cup, in addition to the usual squadron of modified Yamaha MT-07s and Suzuki SV650s, this year at least 10 riders have signed up to race the new Aprilia RS 660, which has been homologated for MotoAmerica competition.
Fans will be allowed at all rounds this year, though some activities, such as autograph sessions and the fan walk in the pits, will be curtailed or eliminated, and some restrictions will apply. Television coverage will be similar to last year, with Superbike races airing on Fox Sports channels, as will the King of the Baggers and Junior Cup. Supersport will appear on MavTV. All practice sessions and races are shown on the MotoAmericaLive+ streaming service.
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