Racers Edge Performance press release:

Racers Edge Performance and Craig McMartin Racing will continue their collaboration and with the continued support of North Coast V-Twins will return to the Australasian Superbike Championship in 2016 to contest the Superbike class with star rider Beau Beaton on board a Ducati Panigale.

In addition to the Superbike class, Beau, along with Ken and Barry Horner, will defend the Pro-Twins titles they won last year on an updated version of the bespoke, all Australian made, Irving Vincent 1600cc 4 valve.

After an extremely successful campaign in 2015 both Racers Edge Performance and Craig McMartin Racing were keen to continue their joint efforts and further the development of the Ducati Panigale for the Superbike class following strong results last year in the Formula Oz class.

With the continued support of North Coast V-Twins, and all the teams long standing sponsors Racers Edge Performance and Craig McMartin Racing are looking forward to another successful season in 2016.

Multiple Australian Pro-Twin champion Craig McMartin is already busy in his workshop building new Panigale race bikes for the new season for Beau, and following some extremely successful outings in 2015, including a round victory in Formula Oz at the final round last year, may even don the leathers for the occasional round in 2016, along with his duties as team Co-Owner and rider mentor.

Never ones to rest on their laurels Ken and Barry Horner have been working hard in their Hallam factory on the next generation of the beautiful 1600cc pushrod V-Twin that was victorious in three classes last season.

2015 also saw huge advances in the chassis setup of the new machine courtesy of the development work by Steve Mudford from Race Dynamics, Steve will also play a pivotal role in adapting the winning form of the Panigale R on Pirelli tyres last season to the Dunlop control tyre used in the Superbike class at all ASC rounds.

I am so excited to announce this move to the Superbike class along with returning to defend the titles we won on the Vincent last season” said Beau Beaton. I am under no illusion of how hard it will be and I am sure the racing will be extremely tough, especially with the return of riders like Robbie Bugden to the championship and Paul Byrne stepping up as well.

I had some great races with him last year in Formula Oz, then you add in the rest of the Superbike class who last year took the spectacle to a new level and you begin to realise how tough it will be. Having Greg and Julie from Racers Edge involved again, Craig McMartin building the bikes and Steve Mudford fine tuning the setup I am confident that we have the package to win races.

Ken and Barry have made massive steps forward in several areas with the Vincent and they are really pushing to ensure we retain the championships we won last year, they are fully focussed on going back to back in 2016.

“We are really happy to announce this move and continue our association with Craig McMartin Racing” commented Team Manager Greg Maher “At the beginning of the year, as we do every year, Julie and I did a mental assessment of if we want to continue racing.

We came to a very quick decision that we are nowhere near ready to give it up yet, and the fact that we will once again be working with great people like Craig, Beau, Ash Beaton from North Coast V-Twins, Mark “Doc” Downie, Steve Mudford from Race Dynamics and of course Ken and Barry Horner made the decision so easy, it is a very enjoyable group of people to go racing with.

Craig builds sensational bikes and we are now busy developing the new Racers Edge Performance fairings for the latest Panigale that has some subtle differences to the previous model, we are doing this in conjunction with Craig McMartin Racing.

We have also decided to once again support the ASC, with over 20 years’ experience Terry runs a great series and we felt it was the only real option for us at this time. I can’t wait to get started racing again in 2016” said an excited Craig McMartin.

“We had some great results last year so we will start the year with Beau riding the same Panigale R he spent last year on, and as soon as the new 2016 R model arrives we will get one of those ready. I have also built a new 1299S that Beau will use as a practice and training bike which will also be a back-up or wet bike at each round.