MotoAmerica: Fong Stays Hot, Wins Superbike Race One At VIR

Bobby Fong (50) leads Josh Herrin (1), Cameron Beaubier (6), Jake Gagne (32), and the rest of the Superbike pack on Saturday at VIRginia International Raceway on Saturday. Photo by Brian J. NelsonBobby Fong Wins Third MotoAmerica Superbike Race In A Row At VIRginia International RacewayAttack Performance Progressive Yamaha Racing’s Bobby Fong won his third straight MotoAmerica Superbike race on Saturday at VIRginia International Raceway as the Californian begins to seriously start clawing his way into contention for the 2025 MotoAmerica Superbike Championship.

For the third race in a row, Fong kept championship rivals Cameron Beaubier and Josh Herrin behind him, and he’s now just one point behind Beaubier and 28 points behind championship leader Herrin.

Starting from pole position, Fong led every lap of Saturday’s race one at VIR, withstanding the near race-long pressure from Beaubier, who had passed Herrin for good on the third lap and set sail after Fong. Shortly thereafter, Beaubier set the fastest lap of the race, a 1:24.287.

Beaubier, however, had to back things down near the end of the race as he was fighting with a lack of grip and knew that he couldn’t match Fong’s late-race pace. At the end of the 20 laps, Beaubier was 7.3 seconds behind Fong, who never put a wheel wrong.

Herrin, meanwhile, had a fight on his hands with Vision Wheel M4 ECSTAR Suzuki’s Sean Dylan Kelly and Fong’s teammate Jake Gagne. Kelly was the most persistent and he took the battle to the bitter end, giving Herrin a nudge in turn one and then striking him a bit harder later on the final lap. At the finish, Herrin was .144 of a second ahead of Kelly.

Gagne backed it off near the end of the race and was some five seconds behind at the finish.

Real Steel Honda’s JD Beach continues to impress on his Stock 1000-spec Honda CBR1000RR-R SP as he finished sixth in the Superbike class while winning the Superbike Cup race within a race.

Jones Honda’s Ashton Yates was seventh after beating BPR Racing’s Bryce Kornbau to the line by a few tenths. Vision Wheel M4 ECSTAR Suzuki’s Richie Escalante struggled to a ninth-place finish and Aftercare Scheibe Racing’s Danilo Lewis rounded out the top 10.

Notable non-finishers included FLO4Law/SBU Racing’s Benjamin Smith, who ran into the back of Real Steel Honda’s Hayden Gillim causing both riders to crash. Gillim remounted to finish 15th.

After 12 races, Herrin leads the title chase by 27 over Beaubier, 240-213. Fong is third with 212 points. Gagne and Escalante round out the top five with 176 and 121 points, respectively.

Bobby Fong won his third straight MotoAmerica Superbike race. Photo by Brian J. NelsonSuperbike Race 1

Bobby Fong (Yamaha)Cameron Beaubier (BMW)Josh Herrin (Ducati)Sean Dylan Kelly (Suzuki)Jake Gagne (Yamaha)JD Beach (Honda)Ashton Yates (Honda)Bryce Kornbau (Yamaha)Richie Escalante (Suzuki)Danilo Lewis (BMW)Quotes

Josh Herrin (1), Sean Dylan Kelly (40), and Jake Gagne (32) battled for third place with Herrin ultimately getting the spot. Photo by Brian J. NelsonJosh Herrin – Third Place

“I thought that those guys would have just dusted by me. I wasn’t trying to really be protective until the last two or three laps. So, it didn’t surprise me, but the moves that Sean (Dylan Kelly) put on me on the last lap would have been like four races in a row of double long-lap penalty in MotoGP these days, so I was surprised about that. He hit me hard. The first time he rubbed me; it left some marks on the leathers. That surprised me, but it was fun. Then this time, it was just a blatant, like there’s no room. I’m not going to get by anywhere else. I’m making room. Slammed into the side of me. Fell off the inside of his bike. Almost took me out. Then knew what he did and waited for me to go by on the brakes, knowing that he needed to give up a position. What was in his head, I could tell. As soon as he saw me on the side of him, he just released brakes, rode around the outside of me and then tried doing the same thing going down the rollercoaster. It was the dirtiest riding that I’ve seen in a while. I’m an aggressive rider, like all these guys in the front. We’ll get aggressive when we need to, but that was straight-up unsafe, like ‘I’m just plowing through your right now riding.’ So hopefully these guys do something about it because if it was me, I would have been starting back of the pack tomorrow. I’ve seen it happen time and time again. I’ve had to clean up my riding a whole lot.”

The battle for victory came down to Bobby Fong (50) vs. Cameron Beaubier (6) with Fong coming out on top. Photo by Brian J. NelsonCameron Beaubier – Second Place

“Like you said, it was good to crawl a couple points back. Coming in here, we wanted to win. We come into every round wanting to win. I think I can say we had a little issue yesterday in the first practice, and we didn’t get a ton of dry time. But those are all excuses. He (Fong) was on freaking rails. He was riding so good. I kept looking at my dash and it was high 24s, high 24s, mid 24s on used tires. Then I saw a gap back to third. I was like, ‘wow, we are ripping.’ It was only a matter of time where I could hang on. I had to kind of let him go. I was taking a lot of risks getting into the corners to make up the lack of edge and grip I had compared to him. But at the beginning, I was really happy with how I was riding. I was able to take some time back to him. I was probably a half second to a second behind him and I was able to close that down. My bike is the best my bike has felt in a couple rounds now. So, I’m really happy with that. We’re trying a little bit different setup this weekend. I think it’s a good direction and we’re just going to keep trying to fine-tune it. Happy with how I rode at the beginning. Yes, we need to make some improvements on half race distance towards the end to run with this guy. Happy to be back at VIR and see what we can do tomorrow.”

Bobby Fong – Winner

“I think with both these guys behind you, it’s always a concern for all of us. You could hear him (Beaubier), too. I could hear his bike. I knew it wasn’t Josh (Herrin) because you always can hear the Ducati compared to the BMW. I could tell he was faster in some areas, because you could hear the bike getting a lot closer. I was like, ‘I just got to keep my pace, keep my head down.’ I was waiting for the moment for him to definitely make a move, for sure. It never came, fortunately for me. We’ve always been pretty good at that at these races. The bike always sounds pretty good at the end of the races. Somehow, I manage to keep the same pace at the end. We just got to keep doing our thing. It’s going to be a long season. We got some tracks where these two dudes are definitely a step above me. So, I need to work on some of the racetracks we’re going to. We’re just going to keep our head down and tomorrow is another day. I’m sure Josh (Herrin) is going to find something overnight and be a lot closer, and same with this guy (Beaubier). It’s definitely going to be more of a dogfight tomorrow with all three of us. Hopefully my teammate Jake (Gagne) could be up there. He’s had some pace here and there, and it would be good to see him back up here.”

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