Saturday’s MotoAmerica race day at Road America was a good one for Westby Racing’s two-rider squad as Superbike rider Mathew Scholtz notched a runner-up finish and, in Junior Cup, Cody Wyman came home seventh.
Mathew’s fourth-place result in Superpole gave him a second-row start in the race. Capitalizing on all the hard work that he and the Westby Racing crew put in during the off-season—both in the race shop and during their on-track test sessions—Mathew exploited the power and prodigious handling of his #11 Yamaha YZF-R1 Superbike and put himself firmly among the frontrunners in the race.
Despite the fact that defending Superbike Champion Cameron Beaubier quickly built an insurmountable lead, Mathew raced hard and bested everyone else in the race besides Beaubier to finish second on the day.
“My start was terrible, as usual,” commented Scholtz. “I’ve kind of gotten used to it by now, but it actually worked out well for me. We missed quite a lot of track time in Friday practice, so I kind of slotted in behind (Bobby) Fong, (Jake) Gagne and them, and I was able to kind of see what they were doing for the first couple laps. I think that really helped me to figure out one or two things. Once I got up to the back of them, I saw that, in some of the harder braking points, I was a little bit stronger than them. With five laps to go, I managed to get past Jake (Gagne) and Bobby (Fong) and just kind of rode my own race from there. I was really looking at where to try to pass. I was told they had their own battle going on, so it kind of worked out well for me. I want to say a huge thank you to the Westby team. I’m just really, really thankful to be back on the podium.”
Mathew’s teammate Cody qualified third in Junior Cup on a track that he hasn’t raced at in five years, which earned him a front-row start in the race. Unfortunately, a technical issue on his #34 Yamaha YZF-R3 hampered his results, but he still managed to finish seventh.
“I had a great morning in final Qualifying, working the air to qualify third and start on the front row, which was my first time on the front row, and it felt awesome. On the warmup lap of the race, I had an issue with the front brakes, and that definitely daunted me in the first half of the race. We’ve got things sorted out for tomorrow’s race, and I can’t wait for another go at it.”
Sunday’s Superbike Race 2 is at 1:00 PM Central and Junior Cup Race 2 is at 3:00 PM Central.
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