Ups and Downs for Ducati Duo in Wisconsin

 Round three of the 2021 MotoAmerica Superbike Championship saw the trials and tribulations of professional motorcycle racing never more evident for Ducati duo Loris Baz and Kyle Wyman.

In a weekend of near perfect racing conditions at the legendary Road America, Baz lit up the scorecard by snatching second place on the line in race one after an epic battle with Suzuki riders Cameron Petersen and Bobby Fong.

The French maestro used all his guile and the speed of the Warhorse HSBK Racing Ducati New York machine to out-drag Petersen to the flag, with Wyman ending race one a solid seventh on the Panera Bread Ducati.

However, as so often goes in motorcycle racing, the Ducati racers were in for a shock in Sunday’s race two with Baz enduring a technical issue and Wyman suffering a crash.

2021 MotoAmerica Superbike Standing – Top 5
P1 – Jake Gagne (Yamaha) 125
P2 – Mathew Scholtz (Yamaha) 107
P3 – Josh Herrin (Yamaha) 83
P4 – Cameron Petersen (Suzuki) 82
P5 – Bobby Fong (Suzuki) 72
P7 – Loris Baz (Ducati) 53
P8 – Kyle Wyman (Ducati) 49

Loris Baz (Warhorse HSBK Racing Ducati New York – Ducati #76)
“It’s been a tough weekend,” Baz said. “I have a bittersweet taste because we struggled a lot in qualifying, but after qualifying we made some big changes on the bike, so thank you to the crew for that. We found the way and we started race one with a totally different bike—I needed a couple of laps to learn the settings—then I managed to improve my pace to get in front of Bobby (Fong) and Cameron (Petersen) at the end.

“We made another big change this morning and I felt so good for race two. We closed the gap to Jake and I was really starting to think we could fight for the win. In such a small time the team did an amazing job with changing the bike, but straight away in lap one I felt something in the engine, and then in lap three it expired. We’ll put our heads down and come back better for the next round.”

Kyle Wyman (Panera Bread Ducati – Ducati #33)
“I crashed in the middle of race two and broke the radius in my elbow,” Wyman said. “I’ll have to wait until Tuesday to get surgery. Up until that point I was having a good race but I was having a few issues with the front. These are the highs and lows of racing. It was a little low side crash and I caught my elbow on the inside of the curb and I felt it immediately. We’ll come back stronger.”