Yoshimura Suzuki's Toni Elias won his third straight race to start his debut season of racing in the 2016 MotoAmerica AMA/FIM North American Road Racing Championship, but defending series champion Cameron Beaubier turned the tables in race two as his miserable luck of the new season finally turned for the better at Road Atlanta.
Elias may have won race one in the Suzuki Superbike Shootout of Georgia after Beaubier was knocked out of the lead in a two-rider crash with his Monster Energy/Graves Yamaha teammate Josh Hayes, but then it was Elias' turn to show a chink in his armor as he crashed out of race two.
With Elias, Hayes and Beaubier all suffering crashes, the man who emerged from Road Atlanta with the biggest smile on his face was Roger Hayden, the Yoshimura Suzuki rider leap-frogging to the top of the championship table after two rounds and four races. Hayden, with his four podium finishes in four races, heads the points table with 76 points - one better than his teammate Elias. Hayes is third with 52 points and Beaubier, who is 38 points behind Hayden, is all the way back in seventh. But it could have been worse for the defending champion if Elias had finished race two.
Both races were thrillers with the top four together for the majority of both. Leading on the 13th lap, Beaubier was hit from behind by Hayes and the pair tumbled off into the gravel on the exit of turn 10B. Hayden took over at the front, but Elias was with him and with a few laps to go the former World Champion took over and held on to win by .343 of a second.
"My plan was not this one," Elias said. "I'd been surprised at the beginning. In turn one I had been struggling a lot all weekend. I wasn't surprised when Roger (Hayden) passed me. Today in warm-up he was really fast. He could stay with us for the race and he showed me on the second lap.
"After that I made a mistake and I lose one second, one second and a half, and in two laps I could catch the group again and that gave me a lot of motivation. I could catch again, especially the last section, but I suffer all day. I try to keep calm and try to not come too tired, I have arm pump. Finally, I push and where I want to pass Roger every lap was yellow flags, yellow flags, yellow flags. I did my best and he was there all the time. We got lucky because the Yamaha guys crashed and I'm sorry because they had good rhythm."
