News - September 7 - New Jersey Motorsports Park Race #2
AMA Superbike Round 11, Race #2Rockstar Makita Suzuki’sTommy Hayden crashes out during battle for the lead
Mat Mladin celebrated his AMA Superbike swan song with a podium appearance at New Jersey Motorsports Park in Millville, New Jersey, on Sunday afternoon. Seven-time AMA Superbike Champion Mladin announced his retirement from AMA Superbike racing earlier this season and this weekend’s double-header event marked the end of the newly crowned 2009 AMA Superbike Champion’s career.
In Saturday’s race, Mladin was in a battle for the lead when he crashed out of the race. On Sunday, he raced his Rockstar Makita Suzuki GSX-R1000 as hard as ever and battled for the lead for most of the race before finishing in an impressive second place. Mladin was joined on the podium by Jordan Suzuki’s AaronYates in third place. Yates and Mladin and Rockstar Makita Suzuki teammate Tommy Hayden had all been battling for podium spots and Hayden was actually making a pass for the lead when he crashed out of the race. Finally, Rockstar Makita Suzuki’s Blake Young finished up the weekend in ninth place after struggling a bit with throughout the weekend.
Tommy Hayden
“It was a fun race, I was having a good time. It was interesting to watch and there was a lot of passing. I really wanted to win a race before the year was over and I wanted to try and get second in the championship and I knew that one would take care of the other. Josh was riding good and hard and Mat was too. It came
down to the end and I thought it was going to be me and Josh and I thought that was pretty cool - kind of the way it’s supposed to be in the last race: two guys are battling it out and they’re the two guys who are battling for overall positions. I just made a little mistake, went in a corner a little too hot and lost the front. It’s a shame. On the one hand, I’m bummed and on the other hand, I left it all out there and that was one thing I wanted to make sure and do today. We learned a lot and we’re looking forward to next year.”
Mat Mladin
”It’s been a good weekend but everything comes on to an end. I have had a fantastic career but it’s time to spend some more time with my family and move on to other areas of my life. This weekend, we had a really
good race and I felt really good for most of it. I really didn’t want to be in second place, I wanted to lead and do as much as I could from the front. I felt a little pressure from Josh (Hayes, race winner) in a couple of spots, but we had a good race today and we put in as much as we could… It was a good, fun race and I’m looking forward to hanging ‘em up, moving on.”
Blake Young
“Starting as far back as we did definitely makes the weekend tough and that showed in both races. It’s pretty hard to get up front and mix it up with those guys when you’re starting from the third row. But I was happy with the weekend because we saw improvement throughout the whole weekend, even though it was tough come race time. But we tried our best. Today the bike was working good - we just struggled trying to get around some of the guys -- but lap times were good and I was happy with the way the race was going. It’s not the best result we’ve had all year, but we learned a lot for off-season testing and we’ll come back stronger next year.”
