MotoAmerica, Fores Still Perfect With Eighth Straight Win Coming At Laguna Seca

Warhorse HSBK Racing Ducati’s Xavi Fores won his eighth straight MotoAmerica Supersport race on Saturday afternoon at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca to break Garrett Gerloff’s consecutive win streak from 2017. Although Fores isn’t the 2023 MotoAmerica Supersport Champion yet, he’s getting close with his perfect 250 points stretching his championship points lead to 100 points after eight races.
 
Supersport – Fores The Record Breaker
 
Xavi Fores wasn’t overly confident going into Saturday’s “Extended” Supersport race after suffering the first two crashes of his season on Thursday and Saturday morning. He also knew that Squid Hunter Racing’s Josh Hayes had good pace. Put those two things together and it was as close to trouble as Fores has been in all year.
 
But then it all fell into place when the race started. Fores suddenly felt more comfortable, and he could match Hayes’ pace, though he did lose valuable time in lapped traffic just prior to the mandatory pit stops.
 
And the pit stop is where Fores won the race, though it wasn’t in his pit. The race was handed to him when Hayes’ crew struggled to get the front wheel into the fork during his stop and it ultimately cost him victory.
 
At the completion of the 38-lap race, Fores was 12.685 seconds ahead of Hayes and had his eighth straight win in hand. Vision Wheel M4 ECSTAR Suzuki’s Tyler Scott finished third with the youngster being caught and passed by Hayes in the closing laps.
 
Tytlers Cycle Racing’s Stefano Mesa and Vision Wheel M4 ECSTAR Suzuki’s Teagg Hobbs rounded out the top five.
 
“I was not 100% convinced about this race, especially after the crash we had this morning because I had some pain in my neck and I was a little bit not 100% concentrated,” Fores said. “I was a little bit confused because the bike was not working 100% well. The front tire consumption all the weekend was horrendous, especially on the left side. Honestly, the first part of the race I had a good fight with Josh, but then on the last four laps before to come in, I lost the front two or three times in turn nine and turn five. I nearly crashed and then I had to run off. Then we got the pack of slow riders. He was really brave passing them on the Corkscrew. After my crash this morning, I said, I’m going to stay away of this. Then I lost a couple of seconds there. But, honestly, when we did the pit stop the guys in the pit stop were working perfectly. My tired changes and my feeling on the bike. We didn’t lose much time there. So, I went out the first two or three corners, the rear tire was a little bit cold, and it took a little bit to get warm. But then when I passed on the straight, I see Josh coming out of the pits but quite early yet, so I said, maybe he had some issue on the pit stop. I started to see I was still P4, then P3, then P1. I was managing the gap on the last 18, 17 laps. So honestly, I was not the fastest one this weekend, but we did a good strategy on the race. I came maybe two laps earlier than we had been expecting, because the front tire was not working well. We managed well the situation. That was the key to win the race. Honestly, Josh was much faster than me this weekend, more solid and especially in the right corners. He was always pulling meters away from me. When I catch him on the first part of the race, I was like, I have no more. I was taking some risks. So fair play to him, his team. It was a shame to don’t arrive to the end of the race fighting me and him because it would be great to have a good battle with him until the last lap.”