ALTON, Va. — Attack 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 J.D. 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.
