Fans attending the World Superbike Championship around at Laguna Seca next week will have another hometown favorite to cheer for, as Josh Herrin will do double-duty at the California round, racing in both the MotoAmerica and WorldSBK superbike races.
Of note too, Herrin will ride the same Attack Performance prepped Yamaha YZF-R1 in the WorldSBK races at Laguna Seca, that he currently uses in the MotoAmerica Championship.
Joining fellow Americans Jake Gagne and PJ Jacobsen on the on the grid at Laguna Seca, Herrin will have a tough task ahead of him at the US round, with MotoAmerica bikes typically slower at the technical track than their WorldSBK-spec counterparts.
It is not clear if Attack Performance will be making any changes to Herrin’s R1 between the differing sessions, beyond setup for the different spec tires of course (MotoAmerica runs Dunlop slicks, while World Superbike uses Pirelli, two tires that couldn’t be more different from each other), though potentially the team could take advantage of the differing WorldSBK rules to find more speed around the track.
The 2013 AMA Superbike Champion, and a former Moto2 competitor, Herrin will become the 69th American rider to start a WorldSBK race.
As of late, Herrin’s “privateer” MotoAmerica superbike entry – if you can call anything that Richard Stanboli touches a privateer effort – has been dicing things up at the front of the pack, routinely giving it to both Yamaha and Suzuki’s factory-backed riders.
As such, Herrin’s wild card entry and MotoAmerica races will surely be seen by the WorldSBK paddock as an audition into its ranks, which may be good timing as the World Superbike silly season is just starting to heat up.
Source: WorldSBK; Photo: Brian J. Nelson
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