WESTBY RACING
NEWS AND UPDATES
The Barber Motorsports Park Finish Line Eludes Mathew Scholtz And The Westby Racing Team In MotoAmerica Superbike Race One
Birmingham, AL – September 22, 2019 –
The dreaded letters “DNF” are an unfortunate part of motorcycle road racing, but for Mathew Scholtz and the Westby Racing team, “Did Not Finish” is rarely used to classify a race result for the gold-liveried #11 Yamaha YZF-R1 Superbike. Saturday’s race one result, the penultimate race of the 2019 MotoAmerica Superbike Championship, however, went down in the books as a “DNF” for Mathew and the team.
Team manager Chuck Giacchetto described the day by saying, “It just wasn’t our day, really. Things started out like gangbusters, and the crew did a great job overnight to get the bike ready for Superpole and the first race. Superpole started out excellent on the harder race tire, but when the fellas put in the softer compound, the tire fell off quickly. No fault of the tire or the crew since we are all working with some big unknowns from the newly repaved Barber surface. By the time Mathew realized the two laps were gone, there just wasn’t enough time to come in for another tire option. But we got some valuable setup info that would pay dividends in Saturday’s race.
“In the race, it seemed like the battle was coming back to us, and we felt pretty good about our position as the laps wound down. Unfortunately, though, bad luck showed its face and Mathew had to retire from the race. He made a wise decision to come in and avoid any severe damage to the number 11 bike. The crew went to work, busted their butts, and got the bike ready for race two on Sunday. We’re ready to finish the season strong, in true Westby Racing form.”
Summing up his Saturday, Mathew said, “In Superpole, we qualified further back than we’d liked to have been. I never really got the hang of the softer tire on the freshly paved race surface, to be honest. But, we were confident that our race pace would be good on the harder compound, and that we’d especially be strong in the last 10 laps of the race. After the start, I got in the group battling for the podium, with (Jake) Gagne, (JD) Beach, (Josh) Herrin, and Toni (Elias), and we were all running the same pace, but unfortunately, we suffered a mechanical issue with the bike, so that was disappointing. But, we’ll put that one behind us. It always feels like we make a big step forward in the second race, and the bike is ready to go for Sunday, so I’m looking forward to ending the season on a high note and getting on the podium for the team and our fans.”
Superbike race two, the final race of the 2019 season, goes green at Barber Motorsports Park on Sunday at 3 PM Eastern Time.
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