VOL. 50 ISSUE 29 JULY 23, 2013
P89
SERIES
tween Roberts and his California Superbike School/
Roadracing World-backed
Honda, The RoadRace Factory Yamaha of Tomas Puerta and the National Guard/
Celtic Racing Suzuki of Corey Alexander.
And it went the distance,
culminating with a final lap
that was a thriller. It was
Puerta leading Roberts
and Alexander at the start
of that last lap, but when
they headed up the hill to
the Corkscrew for the final time, Roberts drove it
past Puerta on the brakes
as he'd done before in this
one. He ran in a bit deep,
however, and had to flick
the Honda hard to the left, then
ran down the Corkscrew on the
inside curbing. When he was
forced to run wide on the exit,
Puerta had to check up because
he was on the outside. That put
the pair side-by-side through the
downhill left that is Rainey Curve.
Roberts came out in front, but
Puerta had one last go at him
on the brakes into turn 11, the
final left-hand hairpin that leads
the front straight. But Roberts
showed his racecraft by letting
the Colombian run wide before
squaring him up and beating him
to the flag by just .117 of a second. Alexander, meanwhile, was
watching from a shadow third
and finished just .294 of a second behind Roberts.
Baby Appleseed/CM Motorsports-backed Jeffrey Tigert, who
Roberts is starting to get good at
this champagne thing. The 16-yearold is three for three in his first season of AMA Supersport racing even
though his full-time gig is the Red
Bull Rookies Cup in Europe.
ran with the top group prior to the
red-flag that was brought out when
Travis Ohge crashed in turn six,
ended up having to fight back from
a bad start, but he made it to fourth
by the end of the race. He was 6.8
seconds behind. Stefano Mesa
rounded out the top five on the Motosport.com-backed Yamaha.
The race was marred by
Ohge's accident with dire reports
circulating through the paddock
by the end of the day. Although
Ohge suffered serious injury and
was airlifted to Santa Clara hospital in San Jose, reports on Saturday night and Sunday morning
were that his injuries had stabi-
lized and he was out of immediate danger.
"It was a really, really good
race," Roberts said. "I thought
I'd be able to pull away and do
something like I did at Barber,
but these guys rode really quick
this weekend. It was a hard
race for sure. I put my head
down and as soon as… I made
a little mistake in turn one and
ran wide and Corey Alexander
and Tomas Puerta went by me
and so I had to make some aggressive passes just to get right
back to the front. I did it right
away and it was a really good
race and it's funny on the last
lap I knew Puerta was going to
make a move on the last corner. As soon as I saw his bike
I knew he was going to run wide
because I broke really late, so if
I broke really late he broke even
later. I just got the drive and it's
been a dream come true to come
to Laguna and win. To come here
and win it's just amazing."
Puerta leads the AMA Supersport West point standings with
143 points to Tigert's 98.
CN
Supersport
1. Joe Roberts (Honda)
2. Tomas Puerta (Yamaha)
3. Corey Alexander (Suzuki)
4. Jeffrey Tigert (Yamaha)
5. Stefano Mesa (Yamaha)
6. Sebastio Ferrera (Yamaha)
7. Wyatt Faris (Yamaha)
8. Charles Weaver (Yamaha)
9. Ryan Matter (Yamaha)
10. Cameron Gish (Yamaha)
