Mat Mladin won his seventh AMA Superbike race of the season on Sunday afternoon at Barber Motorsports Park in Birmingham, Alabama. Despite lengthy delays in the racing program due to heavy rain and tornado warnings, an abbreviated, 16-lap AMA Superbike race was run at the end of the day and six-time AMA Superbike Champion Mladin picked up his 79th career AMA Superbike win. Jordan Suzuki’s Aaron Yates followed Mladin home in second place and picked up his best result of the season. Rockstar Makita Suzuki teammate Tommy Hayden struggled with the track’s semi-wet conditions and finished up in eighth place, while Rockstar Makita Suzuki’s Blake Young crashed early on and was unable to finish the race.
1st – Mat Mladin Speaks…
"It’s good to get seven AMA Superbike wins in a row. Now we’ll go to Infineon and see if we can get
another one. The Rockstar Makita Suzuki GSX-R1000 worked great today. We found some stuff out this
morning in the warm-up and I had a completely different motorcycle in the afternoon. I was able to run
some lap times that were very similar to this morning, even with the wet conditions of the track and that’s
pretty good. I feel like we’ve made a lot of progress with the new 2009 bike this weekend."
2nd – Aaron Yates Speaks…
"It’s great to be on the podium again, it’s been a while. This weekend has been up and down for us. We
only got the 2009 Jordan Suzuki GSX-R1000 a few weeks ago and we’re still getting it sorted out. But I’m
feeling pretty good about the bike, and it’s running pretty good. It just feels great to get back up on the
podium and show how hard the Jordan Suzuki guys are working."
8th – Tommy Hayden Speaks…
"It was just an awkward day today. Once we got out on the track, it was a struggle with all the wet
spots and I had a hard time feeling comfortable. It felt very slippery and I couldn’t get into a good
rhythm. It was getting a little better as the race went on, but not good enough. It was unfortunate,
but at the end of the day, I think I’m in a pretty similar position in the points as far as the gap
behind me, so that’s a positive. Also, I did learn a lot with the new Suzuki that I think we can put to
use in the next race."
Next race at Infineon Raceway in Sonoma, California, on the weekend of May 15-17, 2009.
