Second straight for DiSalvo

From AMA Pro Racing

SONOMA, CA - Team Latus Motors Racing's Jason DiSalvo took his second consecutive 2011 AMA Pro Daytona SportBike win Saturday, but for many fans and spectators, the hero of the 22 laps was second-place finisher Jake Holden. Holden, who began the 2011 season with an East Coast-based team, showed up at Infineon Raceway's Round 2 under the Jake Holden Racing banner, a grassroots-funded effort supported mainly by friends, family, and small, individual sponsors.

"We're little under-funded," said Holden, after taking Friday's provisional pole, "but I've got some great friends and sponsors. I'm living a dream. I get emotional thinking about how everyone is helping."

Race fans shared in that emotion Saturday, as Holden started the race by putting an immediate pass on then-second Danny Eslick (GEICO Powersports RMR Suzuki) and setting out after DiSalvo, refusing to be shaken from the latter's rear wheel as the two built a steadily increasing gap on the rest of the field. While a 10-bike freight train snaked through the turns behind them, Holden repeatedly tried the inside and outside of DiSalvo's every turn, until a mistake sent him into the grass at Turn 4 with more than half the race remaining.

Having stayed upright, Holden blended back into the field in seventh and began methodically picking off the riders ahead, first dispatching GP Bike Parts Racing's Cameron Beaubier and Vesrah Suzuki's Cory West, then Y.E.S./Pat Clark/Graves Motorsports' Tommy Aquino, and Celtic Racing/Fast by Ferracci's PJ Jacobsen. The next in line - Eslick - put up significantly more of a fight, but in the end was left in the dust as Holden dove around the outside and put three bike-lengths on the GEICO rider before Eslick had a chance to react.

DiSalvo, at this point, was a full eight seconds ahead of second place, but with Holden laying down blazingly quick laps and 11 laps still remaining, the math pointed to the possibility of a dramatic last few laps.

As the laps ticked down, so too did the gap under Holden's unrelenting assault. DiSalvo's lead narrowed from eight seconds to just a few tenths over four seconds in a handful of laps, but there DiSalvo was able to stop Holden's charge, ramping up his own laptimes enough to maintain the cushion. Though Holden eventually had to cede to the value of a second-place finish vs. throwing it all away, the hard riding had carried the pair a whopping 15.6 seconds ahead of third-place Eslick by the finish.

"At the beginning I felt like we were running a pretty good pace.... I was just trying to run a pace I could run for 22 laps," DiSalvo explained. "I think I know the lap that Jake ran off, because I could hear his bike behind me - it got real loud, and then it went away. Once that happened, that reflected immediately on my pit board, so knew I had a big gap. I kind of put my head down for a couple laps, extended it out to six seconds, then let up for a little bit and just started managing the gap that we had. Then all of a sudden it started to shrink, rather quickly. I looked over and saw Jake was in second ... all I knew is that I needed to ride harder. I put my head down and was able to keep Jake at bay and keep the gap pretty solid, but I definitely think tomorrow's going to be a dog fight again."

"[Going off-track] was just a stupid mistake," Holden admitted. "I got a little too close to Jason trying to settle in with him maybe get a rhythm going; got too close and ran wide. I got back on, but by that point I was pretty pissed off at myself because my crew working so hard to get this program together and I didn't want to let them down. So I just put my head down and went, didn't really pay attention to anything.

"[Finishing second] is great; I mean, we would have liked to win, but second place is good, and I think it's well-deserved for our team. I'm just a small piece of this puzzle; everybody from management to friends from the Northwest have helped out and made this successful."

"I got a good launch right from the get-go and settled into second, then Jake went by," Eslick said. "I had those guys to chase for the first few laps ... but that was a tough race; once those guys took off, it was pretty much uneventful. Hats off to those guys, they rode a heck of a race. I think I might need a 12-gauge with a three-and-a-half-inch magnum to catch these ducks."

Behind Eslick, the top 10 crossed in the following order: Jacobsen, Aquino, West, Beaubier, Paul Allison (Triple Crown Industries), Tyler Odom (Don Odom Racing), Tyler O'Hara (GP Bike Parts Racing).

Saturday's AMA Pro Road Racing Round 2 action at Infineon Raceway kicked off with AMA Pro Motorcycle-Superstore.com SuperSport Race 1, which was utterly dominated by Roadracingworld.com's Benny Solis. Solis, piloting the lone Honda in the field, took over the lead almost immediately from LTD Racing Y.E.S. Yamaha's Tomas Puerta, who received a five-second penalty for jumping the start. Looking incredibly smooth, Solis was never headed during the 18-lap race, taking his career first AMA Pro Road Racing victory in style.

Puerta's job, once the penalty was assessed, was relatively straightforward: get those five seconds back, thus turning the second position he held visually on the track into a scoreboard reality. He got the job done without incident, but his LTD teammate, David Gaviria, had a significantly harder time bringing home his podium result, being haunted in the final laps by Vesrah Suzuki's hard-charging Corey Alexander.

Chris Fillmore earned his career first AMA Pro Road Race win on Saturday, taking victory in the Infineon Raceway AMA Pro Vance & Hines XR1200 event. The RMR Bruce Rossmeyer Daytona Racing rider, who'd taken pole earlier in the day, led nine of the contest's 11 laps, and he was joined on the podium by Drag Specialties riders Michael Barnes and Steve Rapp in second and third, respectively.

Daytona SportBike Race Results
1. Jason DiSalvo (Team Latus Motors Racing) Ducati 848 22 Laps
2. Jake Holden (Roberson Motorsports) Ducati 848 +7.622
3. Danny Eslick (Richie Morris Racing) Suzuki GSX-R600 +23.255
4. PJ Jacobsen (Celtic Racing) Ducati 848 +25.173
5. Tommy Aquino (YES, Pat Clark Sports, Graves, Yamaha) Yamaha YZF-R6 +31.152
6. Cory West (Vesrah Suzuki) Suzuki GSX-R600 +40.063
7. Cameron Beaubier (GP Bike Parts Racing) Yamaha YZF-R6 +40.348
8. Paul Allison (Triple Crown Industries) Yamaha YZF-R6 +56.267
9. Tyler Odom (Don Odom Racing) Honda CBR600RR +57.639
10. Tyler O'Hara (GP Bike Parts Racing) Yamaha YZF-R6 +1:06.628
11. Taylor Knapp (Vesrah Suzuki) Suzuki GSX-R600 +1:12.164
12. Bryce Prince (Bryce Prince Racing) Yamaha YZF-R6 +1:21.329
13. Fernando Amantini (Team Amantini) Kawasaki ZX-6R +1:33.885
14. Josh Galster (Josh Galster Racing) Yamaha YZF-R6 21 Laps
15. Huntley Nash (LTD Racing Y.E.S Yamaha) Yamaha YZF-R6 +7.817
16. Matthew Sadowski (Top Shelf Motorcycles Racing) Ducati 848 +43.012
17. Craig Mason (Team TDS Guns/Fast50s.com/Defense Industries) Yamaha YZF-R6 +43.833
18. David Sadowski, Jr. (Top Shelf Motorcycles Racing) Ducati 848 +50.307
19. Melissa Paris (HT Moto Yamaha) Yamaha YZF-R6 +54.151
20. Oscar Covarrubias (Get Some Racing) Kawasaki ZX-6R +1:08.295
21. Kevin Boisvert (Bayside Performance) Suzuki GSX-R600 +1:26.237
22. Santiago Villa (M4 Suzuki) Suzuki GSX-R600 19 Laps
23. Patrick McCord (Peak Performance Racing) Kawasaki ZX-6R 8 Laps
24. Dane Westby (M4 Suzuki) Suzuki GSX-R600 DNF
25. Josh Herrin (Monster Energy Graves Yamaha) Yamaha YZF-R6 DNS
Race Time: 36:45.519
Margin of Victory: 7.622
Best Race Lap: Jason DiSalvo (1:39.271)