About 30 minutes after taking his first career win at the Mission King Of The Baggers, everything went horribly wrong for Rocco Landers, who crashed out of the BellissiMoto Twins Cup race twice, once remounting, once sitting out. That turned his 19-point lead into a six-point deficit with just tomorrow’s final round of the Twins Cup season remaining at Circuit of The Americas.
The trouble started early when championship points leader Landers crashed his RevZilla/Motul/Vance & Hines Suzuki on lap two while chasing Rodio Racing – Powered by Robem Engineering’s Alessandro Di Mario. Fortunately, Landers was able to remount and work his way through the pack, moving up to 13th after three laps. Then came the final respite when Vision Wheel M4 ECSTAR Suzuki’s Rossi Moor crashed into a violent highside that brought out the red flag, giving Landers another chance.
But the situation repeated itself at the five-lap restart, when Di Mario took the lead, ahead of Giaccmoto Yamaha Racing’s Dominic Doyle and Landers. Then it all went wrong for Landers, again, as he crashed from third place with three laps to go.
It was 15-year-old Di Mario’s second win of the year and sixth consecutive podium… and he now leads the standings heading into tomorrow’s Twins race.
Di Mario’s teammate Gus Rodio finished fourth, while BARTCON Racing’s Mathew Chapin rounded out the top five.
“First of all, I hope Rossi (Moor) is okay,” Di Mario said. “I saw the crash on TV and it was bad. Rocco (Landers) too. I just hope they are okay. I crashed in Barber and lost a lot of points, and today was the day I got them back. So, I’m really happy. I want to thank everyone, the whole team, Kevin, Freddy from home. I haven’t forgotten about you. I love you. My parents. They did everything for me. Thank you all. Matt, Chad, Mike and all my sponsors. HJC, Dainese, Moto Liberty, everyone. Thank you so much.”
Supersport – More problems
With everything on the line for Supersport championship leader Mathew Scholtz and his closest challenger PJ Jacobsen, the results of Saturday’s first race at the Circuit of The Americas were mixed: neither contender finished on the podium.
The action was intense from the start, as the 30-rider field funneled into the tricky first corner hairpin. Jacobsen’s Rahal Ducati Moto Panigale V2 got a little too close to Scholtz’s Strack Racing Yamaha YZF-R6, resulting in Scholtz and EasyHealthPlans.com/TopPro Racing’s Martin Cardenas colliding, causing Scholtz and Cardenas to crash. Cardenas was unable to continue, but Scholtz remounted his bike in 30th place and spent the remainder of the 11-lap race trying to move into a points position, which he missed by just one position at checkpoints.
Meanwhile, up front, Altus Motorsports Suzuki’s Jake Lewis took the lead and held it to the finish line, where he took his first Supersport race win of the MotoAmerica era by nearly three seconds over second-place N2 Racing/BobbleHeadMoto Yamaha rider Blake Davis. Third place went to Jacobsen’s Rahal Ducati Moto teammate Corey Alexander, who overcame a gearbox issue on his bike to round out the podium.
Speaking of Jacobsen, his fifth-place finish allowed him to reduce Scholtz’s championship lead from 25 points to just 14 with three races remaining in the season.
“I feel like I could have raced with Matthew (Scholtz) or PJ (Jacobsen),” Lewis said. “I don’t know if PJ had a meltdown or what. I had a good pace in practice. I could do the lap time myself. I was finally getting pretty good on the brakes. We’ve made a lot of progress over the last couple of weekends. I can feel the front end underneath me. That’s the biggest thing for me: working on that front tire. I had a good pace and that showed in the race. Once I got to the front, I put my head down, but I rode smart and kept putting laps in. Then, with four laps to go, I don’t know if they were showing me on TV or not, but I had a big moment in the stadium section. The rear just spun. I was modulating the throttle and the rear just spun, taking both feet off. I got a little scared, then I looked to the side and realized I had a big gap. I hadn’t won a Supersport race in a long time and this was a great result for the Altus Motorsports team. So, I backed off a little bit and picked my lines. Honestly, I just took it easy for the last four laps. I have a great pace on this track and I didn’t want to do anything stupid. So, I’m really happy with this lap and proving some people wrong.”
Mission Super Hooligan National Championship – The West Is Coming
Saddlemen/Harley-Davidson’s Cory West prevailed in the two-way battle for the Mission Super Hooligan National Championship on Saturday at COTA, but he didn’t dislodge S&S/Indian Motorcycle’s Tyler O’Hara as initially thought.
West led from the start and had O’Hara with him, but O’Hara wasted no time in taking the lead. The race changed completely when O’Hara crashed in the first corner. The incident changed the complexity of the race, as West was wise enough not to put up too much resistance to either O’Hara’s teammate Troy Herfoss or his own teammate Jake Lewis. Herfoss and Lewis, meanwhile, battled it out for the lead, with O’Hara getting back on track and making big strides in the top 10.
At the finish line, Herfoss beat Lewis by just 0.434 seconds, while West was third with 1.659 seconds. It was Herfoss’s second win of the season and his first since Daytona in March.
Next up, a pair of S&S/Indian Motorcycle FTR1200s ridden by Jeremy McWilliams and O’Hara, who had somehow fought their way up to fifth place, scored 11 points and kept their championship hopes alive.
With only tomorrow’s game remaining, West leads O’Hara by nine points.
“It was a really cool race, and hearing that Tyler (O’Hara) kind of picked his bike up and got fifth in a completely dry race is scary for tomorrow,” Herfoss said. “I don’t want to race him. It’s still wide open though. When he went down, I thought the championship was over. Then I had to try to catch Cory (West) rather than let the race happen. Cory was going so fast. I didn’t know how to catch him. I had to use Jake (Lewis) to learn a little bit about how to slipstream once we got there. Jake is an old-school rider. He understands that the fastest guy doesn’t always win. It’s all about being up front. There were some fun moves. Hopefully he had fun. I really enjoyed it. I’ve wanted to race him all year, but he’s always been too fast for me. I’m really happy to be here. Thanks to Indian Motorcycle. It’s my second win on the FTR1200 and we’re here.” Mission Foods, Progressive, S&S Cycle. We have a lot of great supporters. I owe them a few more wins with this bike, so I’m happy to get one. I’m even happier that Tyler is still fighting for the championship.”
King of the Bagger Mission – Landers Gets His First Victory
RevZilla/Motul/Vance & Hines Harley-Davidson rider Rocco Landers has shown flashes of brilliance in his rookie season at the Mission King Of The Baggers. On Saturday at COTA, Landers was able to take that speed and talent and turn it into his first win on a big V-twin.
Earlier this year, Herfoss praised the 19-year-old, calling Landers “an ambitious young man.” As is fitting, Herfoss lost a race-long battle with Landers.
While Herfoss doesn’t like to lose, he had fun cutting Harley-Davidson Factory Racing rider Kyle Wyman’s lead in half from 14 points to just seven. Herfoss heads into tomorrow’s second race with a 295-288 point gap over Wyman.
Third place went to Herfoss’ teammate Tyler O’Hara, who rode hard to help out his S&S/Indian Motorcycle teammate, holding off Wyman and RevZilla/Motul/Vance & Hines Harley-Davidson’s Hayden Gillim, who rounded out the top five finishers.
All results HERE
