2014 AMA Superbike – Barber Results

Josh Hayes captured his third and fourth wins of the 2014 AMA Superbike season to take the double at Barber Motorsports Park. The two wins moved Hayes to the top of the championship standings from third as the three-time champion put himself in good position to win a fourth.

The Monster Energy Graves Yamaha rider had a relatively easy Race One as several top rivals crashed on the hot Alabama track.

First to fall was Martin Cardenas, crashing his Yoshimura Suzuki GSX-R1000 on the opening lap. Next came Hayes’ teammate Cameron Beaubier, crashing his R1 on Lap 5 at nearly the same spot on the track. On the following lap it was Geico Honda CBR1000RR rider Chris Ulrich‘s turn, his crash bringing out a red flag.

After the restart, it was Hayes once again in front with Yoshimura Suzuki’s Roger Hayden on his heels. Hayden stayed with Hayes for several laps before crashing out on Lap 16.

With Hayden’s crash, the drama shifted to a new battle for second between ADR Motorsports Suzuki rookie David Anthony and HMC KTM‘s Chris Fillmore. It appeared as though KTM was about to score its first AMA Superbike podium until the RC8R suffered a mechanical issue.

Hayes would claim the easy victory by more than 12 seconds while Anthony takes his second career AMA podium. Yoshimura Suzuki’s Chris Clark took third, thanks to Fillmore’s DNF.

Hayes continued his momentum in Sunday’s Race Two, jumping out to an early lead and forcing his rivals, most of whom crashed out in Saturday’s Race One, to press harder to catch up. But they could not, as Hayes continued to stretch his lead, at one point holding a 12-second advantage.

The fight for second featured Yoshimura Suzuki teammates Cardenas and Hayden for the first 14 laps. Beaubier then entered the fray, coming back from a poor start. Beaubier moved up into third as Hayden began to fade, and turned his attention to Cardenas. Beaubier appeared to have the momentum going into the final laps until he made a mistake on Lap 19; he remained upright but was forced to settle for third.

With the double, Hayes moves up to the top of the standings with 145 points. Anthony’s impressive rookie campaign (with top five finishes in all six races this season) puts him up to second ahead of the veteran Hayden. Beaubier drops out of the top spot to fourth while Clark rounds out the top five.

The 2014 AMA Superbike Championship continues July 13 at Laguna Seca.

[Source: AMA Pro Racing]

By Dennis Chung