The racing season was a bookend of sorts with a strong opening seeing Elias race the Yoshimura Suzuki GSX-R1000 Superbike to five wins in six rounds to open a lead in the championship. Then came a challenging mid-season stretch where Elias and the team had some difficulties coming to terms with a newly-designed racing tyre. Elias rallied late in the year to win three of the final five rounds, including a sweep of the series finale to exit 2018 on a high note.“It was a great way to end an up-and-down season,” said Yoshimura Suzuki racing head Don Sakakura. “We started so strong and then had some challenges in the middle of the season. But we rebounded and closed out the year on a positive note. The team plans to take this momentum and carry it into off-season testing and then into next year’s championship.”Elias made history in early May when he won his 20th MotoAmerica Superbike race in race one at Virginia International Raceway. That VIR victory put Elias in an elite group of just six other riders in the 42-year history of the series to accomplish that 20-win mark. The Spanish veteran got to 20 wins faster than any other riders in series history. The former Moto2 World Champion reached 20 wins in a remarkable 43 races – four races faster than Fred Merkel did in 1986, establishing a new MotoAmerica/ AMA Superbike record that lasted 32 years!In July at the MotoAmerica Championships of Utah, Elias scored an inspiring come-from-behind victory marking the 200th win for Suzuki in the MotoAmerica/ AMA Superbike Championship. Suzuki was the first manufacturer to reach that landmark and is the all-time wins leader among manufacturers in the 42-year history of MotoAmerica/ AMA Superbike.Kerry Graeber, Suzuki’s Vice President, Sales and Marketing, said: “Reaching 200 wins in MotoAmerica/ AMA Superbike shows the unwavering commitment Suzuki has to racing in America. Suzuki engineers in Japan have given us an amazing motorcycle in the GSX-R1000, which carries on the lineage of Suzuki’s championship-winning sportbikes. We’ve also 21been fortunate to have so many great riders race for us in the past who helped make this possible, not to mention the teams and crew members who worked so hard to help make Suzuki the winningest motorcycle in the history of the series.”The year also marked both a somber and celebratory occasion when team rider Roger Hayden retired at the end of the year. The Yoshimura Suzuki standout and former AMA Supersport Champion, was the youngest of the “sUZUKI WAs thE FIRst MANUFACtURER tO REACh thAt lANdMARK ANd Is thE All-tIME WINs lEAdER AMONG MANUFACtURERs IN thE 42-YEAR hIstORY OF MOtOAMERICA/ AMA sUPERBIKE”
元のページ ../index.html#22