Motourage

Jake Zemke, riding the all-black Project 1 Atlanta Yamaha R6, laid down the class’ fastest lap in virtually the last possible moment of AMA Pro Daytona SportBike qualifying to capture pole for today’s 70th Daytona 200 at Daytona International Speedway. His pole-winning time of 1:49.775 also earned him the coveted Rolex watch, which will be formally presented before the 200. Team Latus Motors Racing’s Jason DiSalvo took second, with GEICO/RMR Suzuki’s Danny Eslick and Team Cycle World/Attack Performance Kawasaki’s JD Beach rounding out the front row.

Project 1 Atlanta's Jake Zemke

Jake Zemke, Pole: “At the start of the session I just let everybody go; I just wanted to get some clear track and ride the bike a little bit. I don’t have a lot of laps on that bike so I’m not 100% comfortable with it yet. I have a little bit of the flu—been sick all week—and yesterday I didn’t really have my head around it, so today I wanted to ride my own pace, ride my own laps, find my own lines. Jason put down a pretty good lap early and I thought, ‘Wow, that’s going to be a hard time to beat.’ But the last two laps I started to see where I was going to get a little bit of clear track, and that last lap just worked out really well. It really didn’t feel overly special, though—I thought Jason got the pole. I came around the signal area and saw my pit board, and it said .49 P1. I thought, ‘No way,’ and then there’s the agony of riding around the last cool-off lap looking at the board the whole time waiting to see who’s still out there. Luckily, it stuck. It’s pretty nice to get that watch; it’s something that I definitely wanted for a long time.

“I’ll be happy when I get 100 percent out of the bike, but I still haven’t got it yet. The bike is really good, and my guys have been working non-stop since January to get here today in March. We’re an unsponsored team with no money, so we’re pretty happy to be here right now. It’s going to pay off dividends if we can do well in the 200—hopefully that can bring us sponsorship to get us through the rest of the season.”

Jason DiSalvo, 2nd: “I’ve had Miguel [Duhamel] to do it to me twice [take pole away on the last lap]—it’s not a new experience for me. Maybe we can win the race and I can make Danny an offer to buy his. It seems like that’s the only way I’m going to get one of those things.”

Danny Eslick, 3rd: Jake definitely pulled me along and got me to the third spot, but it’ll be a good place for us for the 200. The front row’s always a good place to be, because there’s a whole lot of excitement up there.”

Michael Jordan Motorsports Suzuki scored a podium and maintains the AMA Superbike Championship points lead after completing races five and six of the 2010 AMA Pro Road Racing series at Road Atlanta in Braselton, Georgia this weekend.

Jordan Motorsports Suzuki's Jake Zemke scored 3rd and 4th-place finishes at Road Atlanta

National Guard Jordan Suzuki’s Jake Zemke scored a third place podium finish on Saturday and finished fourth in Sunday’s race as injured Aaron Yates’ replacement rider Brett McCormick had a tough first weekend; crashing-out of Saturday’s race and experiencing a mechanical issue on Sunday after just nine laps.

Zemke found himself involved in a four-man battle at the front for the entire 20-lap race on Saturday. He slipped into second in the final stages but was unable to hold off the pack as he crossed the line in fourth. He was later awarded a third-placed podium finish after the race winner, Graves Yamaha’s Josh Hayes, was assessed a 21.4 second penalty. On Sunday, Zemke was slightly off the pace, maintaining fourth place throughout most of the race and finishing fourth. But he heads to the next event at Infineon Raceway with a four-point lead in the championship.

“Saturday wasn’t horrible,” Zemke said. “We got out there in the race and the pace was quite a bit slower than what we’d been running in practice and with the guys in front of us, we just couldn’t seem to get off the corners. Today, it seemed like I was getting yanked off the slower corners, so we changed quite a bit on the bike – changed the gearing, changed everything to try and fix that problem and we just ended up shooting ourselves in the foot a little bit. Every time we’re going out, we’re learning and unfortunately we learned a hard one this weekend. We’ve definitely got to get our act together if we’re going to win this Championship, so we’ll put our heads together and see what we can come up with for Infineon. I’m still leading the points, but it’s not even worth saying I’m leading right now. Tommy’s running good right now and obviously Josh and Blake this weekend; they were definitely running real strong as well, so it’s going to be a fight to the end and that’s why we got to get on our game and make sure we’re there every week.”

This weekend’s event was particularly significant for Georgia Army National Guard’s 48th Infantry Brigade Combat Team. Jake Zemke’s National Guard Suzuki GSX-R1000 was sporting the state patch in honor of the historic combat brigade. The corresponding National Guard state patches will be placed on Zemke’s Suzuki for the remainder of the 2010 season.

The 2010 Michael Jordan Motorsports team’s next event will be at the West Coast Motto Jam at Infineon Raceway in Sonoma, California on May 14-16th.

National Guard Jordan Motorsports' Jake Zemke leads the field at Daytona

Suzuki continued its tradition of owning the racetrack at the opening round of AMA American Superbike series in Daytona Beach, Florida this weekend – the GSX-R1000 taking seven of the top-10 spots overall after two days of racing.

National Guard Jordan Suzuki team rider Jake Zemke took first place in both 44-mile, 15-lap races and Tommy Hayden steered his Rockstar Makita Suzuki GSX-R1000 to second place in both races. On Friday, he and Zemke were only .009 seconds separated as they crossed the finish line.

Jordan Suzuki’s Aaron Yates took pole position after setting the quickest qualifying lap in the day leading up to the double header; ending up fourth overall at the end of the event, while Blake Young, in his second year with the Rockstar Makita team, took fifth overall after grabbing the holeshot in Thursday’s race and leading for a few laps.

The RoadRacingWorld.com Suzuki, with Chris Ulrich aboard, took sixth overall. Taylor Knapp and his RidersDiscount.com Suzuki took seventh, and Shane Narbonne finished ninth on his DASPerformance.com GSX-R1000.

In the 69th running of the legendary Daytona 200, Geico Powersports RMR Suzuki’s Danny Eslick raced his GSX-R600 to the pole position and won the Rolex award for fastest qualifier. Eslick battled through the cold and challenging 200-mile race and took fourth, as Vesrah Suzuki’s Cory West took sixth overall. 

Daytona Superbike Race 1:
1. Jake Zemke (Suzuki)
2. Tommy Hayden (Suzuki) +0.238
3. Larry Pegram (Ducati) +0.259
4. Aaron Yates (Suzuki) +0.291
5. Blake Young (Suzuki) +0.307
6. Chris Ulrich (Suzuki) +27.398
7. Taylor Knapp (Suzuki) +27.43
8. Shawn Higbee (Ducati) +1 lap
9. Shane Narbonne (Suzuki) +9.078
10. Barrett Long (Ducati) +16.377

Daytona Superbike Race 2:
1. Jake Zemke (Suzuki)
2. Tommy Hayden (Suzuki) +0.009
3. Ben Bostrom (Yamaha) +0.081
4. Aaron Yates (Suzuki) +0.212
5. Larry Pegram (Ducati) +0.858
6. Josh Hayes (Yamaha) +1.838
7. Blake Young (Suzuki) +22.383
8. Brett McCormick (Suzuki) +29.235
9. David Anthony (Suzuki) +34.124
10. Taylor Knapp (Suzuki) +34.404 

Top 10 Points Standings:
1. Jake Zemke 62
2. Tommy Hayden 50
3. Larry Pegram 37
4. Aaron Yates 37
5. Blake Young 30
6. Taylor Knapp 25
7. Ben Bostrom 24
8. Chris Ulrich 24
9. Josh Hayes 23
10. Shane Narbonne 20

Jake Zemke took a hard-earned victory aboard his No. 54 National Guard Jordan Suzuki GSX-R1000 in the opening round of AMA Pro National Guard American SuperBike competition during the Daytona 200 Week at Daytona International Speedway. Zemke led six of the race’s 15 laps in the afternoon race around the 2.90-mile short course at the famed circuit.

After a thrilling AMA Pro Racing SuperSport race, the AMA Pro American SuperBike field lined up under sunny skies and the warmest temperatures of the event so far.  The exciting qualifying session saw Aaron Yates take pole position for the doubleheader races on his No. 23 Michael Jordan Motorsports Suzuki GSX-R1000, followed by practice pacesetter Larry Pegram with his No. 72 Foremost Insurance Ducati 1098R and Rockstar Makita Suzuki GSX-R1000 teammates No. 22 Tommy Hayden and No. 79 Blake Young completing the front row.  Josh Hayes and his No. 4 Team Graves Yamaha YZF-R1 and eventual day one race winner Zemke were next up alongside Ben Bostrom’s No. 155 Pat Clark Motorsports Yamaha YZF-R1 and an impressive Chris Ulrich on his No. 18 RoadRacingWorld.com Suzuki GSX-R1000. 

At the start, Young shot into the lead as Yates slipped to fourth.  Ulrich jumped up to sixth, while unfortunately his teammate John Hopkins suffered a mechanical problem on his No. 21 Team M4 Monster Energy Suzuki GSX-R1000 and was unable to finish the race.  Hayes also had a tough day, dropping back at the start, never able to mount a charge back to front.  Young and Hayden ran one-two for a few laps as Pegram battled with Yates and a hard-charging Zemke.  The first five broke away and made the race their own all the way to the finish.  

Zemke took the lead with a huge drafting move on lap seven and led Hayden, Pegram, Young and Yates, all within inches of each other, around the high eastern banking.  Pegram and Hayden went by Zemke on lap 11 with Young and Yates holding station.  Hayden had a near slide in the infield, later saying that it really didn’t hurt his chances at that particular point on the racetrack.  With two laps to go, there was a massive reshuffling as Hayden took the lead and was closely followed by Zemke, Pegram, Yates and Young. 

Hayden finished second and Pegram closed out the podium with third.  Yates and Young took fourth and fifth, respectively, to complete the top five.  Pegram, Yates and Young all turned their fastest laps on the final lap of the race.

After diving into the lead in turn one on the last lap, Zemke was able to break free and build a small gap and as the other riders hit the banking for the final time.  Hayden, Pegram and Yates raced each other hard and allowed Zemke to pull away for a magnificent win, his margin of victory a mere 0.238 of a second.  An emotional National Guard Jordan Suzuki team celebrated after a sensational start to the season.  Under the watchful eye of team owner Michael Jordan, it was a perfect start to the 2010 season for the new rider combination.  Collecting his trophy from sponsor Sgt. First Class John Metzler in Victory Lane, Zemke paid tribute to the men and women serving our country in the National Guard and all of our armed forces all over the world and was also full of praise for his new team. 

The final AMA Pro National Guard American SuperBike race of the Daytona 200 week goes green today (Friday) at 4 p.m. eastern time, and both races can be seen in their entirety this Saturday beginning at 10:30 p.m. ET on SPEED.