Leanfro Mercado(92) and Joey Pacarella(25) at the head of the pack during the SuperSport race at Road Atlanta on Sunday.
Seventeen-year-old Argentinean rider Leandro Mercado (No. 92 Monster Energy Attack Kawasaki Ninja ZX-6R) capped a wild race and weekend with a victory in Sunday's AMA Pro SuperSport presented by Shoei race.
Mercado - who shook off several accidents, early-race rain and a red-flag delay for an oiled track in the SuperSport final - took the lead on Lap 8 and held off polesitter Josh Day (No. 4 Kerker Racing Yamaha YZF-R6) and Joey Pascarella (No. 25 LTD Racing Yamaha YZF-R6). Mercado led Day across the finish line by 2.893 seconds while Pascarella took the SuperSport East points lead with his third-place finish.
"I'm very happy," said Mercado, who also raced alongside teammates Hacking and Roger Hayden in Daytona SportBike at Road Atlanta. "This weekend was a crazy weekend for me. I crashed yesterday twice. Then, in the beginning of the race it was good and it started raining and I crashed, so the red was a little crazy. I was very happy on the second start. It was a fun race. I pushed hard and had to be consistent. I'm very happy. I want to say thanks to my team, Monster Energy Attack Kawasaki, for the great job all weekend. Everybody, my trainer and my family, thanks a lot."
Pascarella, who finished second in the Daytona opener, now leads the SuperSport East Championship with 46 points. Kyle Wyman (No. 33 Harv's Harley Davidson Yamaha YZF-R6), who led and finished sixth at Road Atlanta, is second with 33 points and Mercado made a big jump to third with the 31 points earned for today's victory. Day, who like Mercado went off track early in today's race and took advantage of the red flag restart, is fourth in the standings with 27 points.
It got wet and wild on the back section of the track leading to the red flag restart that gave Mercado, Day and Pacarella the late race advantage.
"I got a little second chance there," Day said. "I had to work a little bit harder from the back, since I had to start way in the back, but I think I was lucky today to get that second chance again. I made another mistake going into Turn 10a at the beginning and ended up losing the front, but ended up coming out as close as we could to the top. It ended up pretty well."
The red flag was displayed on Lap 4 after heavy oil coated the track after the No. 29 Honda CBR600RR of Frank Gillim went down and the No. 55 Yamaha YZF-R6 of Ryan Conrad caught fire. Neither rider was injured and Pascarella had a front seat for all of the action.
"When I went into there, I really didn't even know what was going on," Pascarella said. "Almost everybody crashed in front of me. It was just kind of weird. It happened so fast and everybody was just going down everywhere. I didn't feel the track was slippery, because I slowed down a lot when I saw people going down. I had no problems."
AMA Pro SuperSport presented by Shoei will next race as a part of the Honda Superbike Classic at Barber Motorsports Park, May 1 - 3.
