EBR First American Sportbike To Score Points In WSBK, Makes History

The EBR 1190RX had its best finish to date in the FIM Superbike World Championship (WSBK) series during the only US round at Laguna Seca in Salinas, Calif., this past weekend. In an exciting twist, the wild card entry of Larry Pegram running the #72 Foremost Insurance/EBR/AMSOIL/Hero entry garnered a 14th place finish in the second race, earning the first-ever WSBK points for an American motorcycle manufacturer. 

[In actuality, Pegram's EBR crossed the line in 16th place. However, the two Bimota BB3 entries who finished eighth and ninth with riders Ayrton Badovini and Christian Iddon, respectively, have had their finishes nullified all season because Bimota has not met the FIM's homologation requirements. Therefore, all riders behind the Bimotas moved up two places in the official finishing order. -TS]

“This was such an amazing weekend for me and Pegram Racing,” said Pegram. “To realize my dream of getting points in WSBK on America’s Superbike, and to do it in my initial WSBK outing with the EBR just is incredible.  I want to thank Foremost, AMSOIL, Hero, Superbike Family, all my other sponsors and of course Erik and the EBR guys for building such a great bike. This was my first time on the EBR at Laguna, and it was on tires I hadn’t ridden before, so we were busy learning as fast as we could. Now I’m looking forward to running again, because I know I can go faster next time!”

Geoff May on the #99 Team Hero/EBR 1190RX had a solid consistent weekend running right behind Larry in both races, with finishing positions of 19th in the first round and 16th in the second, equaling the best EBR finish prior to the event.

“This was a very valuable weekend for us,” said EBR founder Erik Buell. “Not only did we get our first points, but we and the teams we work with learned a whole lot about the 1190RX, including a much deeper understanding of bike setups and the respective teams’ engine builds. Geoff and Larry both ran engines we put together in East Troy and they performed very solidly and reliably. So, now we understand where to make performance improvements and can start on a path forward. This is an extraordinarily high level of racing, very far removed from street versions of the bikes, and it takes extreme commitment and plenty of time to get better.”

By Troy Siahaan