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GARRETTGERLOFF
SUPERSPORT
Gerloff was one of the main players in an excit-
ing qualifying session that took place on Saturday
morning after a torrential downpour soaked the four
mile Road America circuit. The rain had subsided
and the track continued to dry throughout the ses-
sion, making the last couple of minutes a shootout
for the front row of the grid.
Gerloff laid down an incredible lap at the last breath of the session in
order to snag pole position away from Team Ham- mer Suzuki’s Valentin Debise, clocking a 2:33.471 in the process. As the lights went out for the second time after the initial start was red flagged, Gerloff shot into the first corner with the early advantage. The Texan had wet tires fitted to his YZF-R6 on a damp, quickly drying track. It set the stage for an interesting narrative, but he was able to burn in- sanely quick laps throughout the early stages of the race, pulling a healthy gap over his competitors as JD Beach stuck with him. The two factory Yamaha teammates were the class of the field as they ran laps almost four seconds faster than any of the riders pursuing them. The sun came out and a dry line began to form towards the end of the race,
but Gerloff did an incredible job at maintaining the Dunlop rubber on his tires as he effortlessly led the field. Beach remained a couple of seconds behind him for the entirety of the race, but the Texan did exactly what he needed to do as he managed the gap with smart, consistent laps all the way until the checkered flag on the way to his third victory of the season. In the second race, Gerloff executed an- other exceptional start as he held the lead through the first corner. The Yamaha rider had a scary moment in which he almost tucked the front end, scrubbing off his mid-corner speed, as both Beach and Debise worked their way around opposite sides of him. He worked his way past the French- man towards the end of the opening lap, but his teammate had already opened a gap of more than a second. Gerloff spent the next few circulations of the four mile course closing down the advantage to- wards the leader, closing up the gap by the midway point of the race. From that point onward, the two Yamaha riders matched each other’s lap times and Gerloff spent a brief stint of the race in the lead on lap seven, but Beach was determined to fight back at every opportunity. The two of them streaked down the back straight away side-by-side on the final lap and Beach slid up the inside of the Texan into turn five, forcing him to make an attempt in the slipstream on approach to the finish line. Gerloff came up just short of doing the double, finishing in second place a mere one tenth behind Beach as the two of them split race victories on the weekend.
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