When Josh Herrin won the 2013 AMA Superbike Championship, he didn’t get the chance to run the big #1 the following season as he was whisked overseas for a rather miserable season in the Moto2 World Championship. This coming weekend at Barber Motorsports Park, that all changes when Herrin and his Warhorse HSBK Racing Ducati Panigale V4 R will don the number-one plate as the defending MotoAmerica Superbike Champions, with the series kicking off its highly anticipated 2025 season.
Based on his performance of a year ago, Herrin will start the season as the favorite to defend his MotoAmerica Superbike title. And why not?
Herrin won last year’s championship by a whopping 55 points after putting together a season that included six wins and 13 total podium finishes. His season started slowly with fifth- and ninth-place finishes in the two races at Michelin Raceway Road Atlanta. Herrin earned his first podium of the young season in the first of three races at Barber Motorsports Park, but he followed that up with a crash in race two and a fourth-place finish in race three. Still, after five races, Herrin was sixth and 48 points behind early season leader Cameron Beaubier.
Then he went on a tear, with podiums in 12 of the next 15 races.
Herrin’s main rival a year ago will likely be his main rival again – Tytlers Cycle Racing’s Beaubier, the five-time MotoAmerica Superbike Champion. Beaubier looked to be headed for title number six when he crashed out of the wet first race at Road America, smashing his heel and forcing him out of the next three races. He tried to come back at Ridge Motorsports Park, but he wasn’t physically ready, and he came out of the round in Washington with just eight points to show for it.
A healthy Beaubier won three races after that to match Herrin’s six victories, but he couldn’t overcome the fact that he failed to score points in six of the 20 races.
Bobby Fong finished third in last year’s championship, highlighted by a pair of victories at Brainerd International Raceway. His speed and newfound consistency earned him a factory ride for 2025 on the Attack Performance Progressive Yamaha Racing YZF-R1, alongside three-time MotoAmerica Superbike Champion Jake Gagne.
Gagne, meanwhile, is hoping to bounce back from a horrid 2024 season that saw him win just one race and ultimately call it quits as his arm-pump problems continued to cause him woes. Gagne will return to action and is hopeful that his health is back to normal. If it is, there is no reason why he can’t challenge for a fourth title.
Sean Dylan Kelly had a breakout rookie season in the MotoAmerica Superbike Championship, taking his first career Superbike win while earning six additional podiums. He ended the year fourth on his Top Pro Racing BMW M 1000 RR, but then the rug was pulled out from under him as the team’s major sponsor pulled out, leaving Kelly without a ride.
That didn’t last long as Kelly got the call to return to the Vision Wheel M4 ECSTAR Suzuki team with which he won the 2021 Supersport title. Kelly will ride one of two Suzuki GSX-R1000R under the M4 awning with his old Supersport rival Richie Escalante returning to the team after injuries forced him to miss 12 races in 2025. When he did come back, Escalante earned his first career Superbike podium at Circuit of The Americas.
The Suzuki-mounted duo should make for a formidable team.
With the support of American Honda, Hayden Gillim is hoping that focusing solely on the MotoAmerica Superbike Championship will bring the results he knows he’s capable of. Riding under the Real Steel Honda banner, Gillim should be a factor, and it wouldn’t be a big surprise to see him and his Honda CBR1000RR-R SP sneak into the top five in the title chase.
Two-time MotoAmerica Superbike winner and two-time MotoAmerica Supersport Champion JD Beach will be the second rider in the Real Steel Honda team, though Beach will focus on bringing Honda the Stock 1000 Championship while also competing for the MotoAmerica Superbike Cup.
Jones Honda’s Ashton Yates is returning for another season on the team’s Honda CBR1000RR-R SP after riding the bike to 10th in last year’s championship with a best finish of sixth. Yates, who won the MotoAmerica Superbike Cup last year with seven straight wins to close out the season, will also race in Stock 1000.
Scheibe Racing owner Steve Scheibe fields Brazilian Danilo Lewis, the Superbike Cup Championship runner-up, on his tried-and-true BMW S 1000RR that was ridden to 18th in last year’s championship by Ezra Beaubier.
Perennial fan favorite Max Flinders will again be racing his signature yellow Thrashed Bike Racing Yamaha YZF-R1 in the 2025 championship, hoping to improve upon his 16th-place finish in last year’s title chase.
Six Yamaha YZF-R1s are entered in the series opener and one of those will be raced by FLO4LAW/SBU Racing’s Benjamin Smith, who fell just two points shy of a top 10 championship finish in 2024.
Bryce Kornbau (Bryce Prince) will lead his two-man team in the opening round of the 2025 MotoAmerica Superbike title chase where he will be joined by Deion Campbell.
Edge Racing’s Josh Waters will ride one of the four BMWs entered in the opening round; ditto for Edge Racing’s Jesse Ruehling, with Joseph Giannotto set to ride the Limitless Racing Honda CBR1000RR-R SP.
Pre-Barber Motorsports Park Notes…
Last year’s MotoAmerica event at the picturesque Barber Motorsports Park was round two of the 2024 MotoAmerica Superbike Championship. This year, Barber moves up a round and becomes the series opener. Unlike last year, the Superbikes will race twice and not three times.
Cameron Beaubier may have crashed out of race one on Saturday last year at Barber, but he bounced back to win both of Sunday’s races for his second and third wins of the season after just two rounds and five races. Cameron Petersen, who has moved to the Supersport class for 2025 with the Warhorse HSBK Racing Ducati team, was the winner of the race that Beaubier didn’t win in Alabama last year.
With his six victories in 2024, Beaubier now has 65 career Superbike wins, which puts him second on the all-time AMA Superbike win list – 17 victories behind the all-time leader, Australian Mat Mladin and his 82 wins.
Mat Mladin is also the Superbike win leader at Barber Motorsports Park. Mladin had nine victories at Barber from 2004 to 2009. Josh Hayes and Cameron Beaubier are tied for second on that list with seven Superbike wins in Alabama.
This year’s race will mark the 23nd consecutive season of AMA Superbike racing at Barber Motorsports Park. Aaron Yates and Kurtis Roberts won the first two AMA Superbike races held at Barber in 2003.
Cameron Beaubier earned pole position for last year’s three Superbike races with his lap of 1:22.446. The five-time MotoAmerica Superbike Champion was joined on the front row by Frenchman Loris Baz and Jake Gagne, with those three the only riders to crack into the 1:22s.
Jake Gagne is the Superbike lap record holder at Barber Motorsports Park after lapping at a best of 1:22.035 in Qualifying 2 in 2023. Gagne also holds the race lap record of 1:22.463, which he set in race two in 2021.
Yamaha leads the way with the most entries for the Superbike class opener with six YZF-R1s entered. Honda is second with five CBR1000RR-R SPs.
