Source: Supplied.

Yoshimura Suzuki’s Toni Elias won his third straight race to start his debut season of racing in the 2016 MotoAmerica AMA/FIM North American Road Racing Championship, but defending series champion Cameron Beaubier turned the tables in race two as his miserable luck of the new season finally turned for the better at Road Atlanta.

Elias may have won race one in the Suzuki Superbike Shootout of Georgia after Beaubier was knocked out of the lead in a two-rider crash with his Monster Energy/Graves Yamaha teammate Josh Hayes, but then it was Elias’ turn to show a chink in his armor as he crashed out of race two.

With Elias, Hayes and Beaubier all suffering crashes, the man who emerged from Road Atlanta with the biggest smile on his face was Roger Hayden, the Yoshimura Suzuki rider leap-frogging to the top of the championship table after two rounds and four races.

Hayden, with his four podium finishes in four races, heads the points table with 76 points – one better than his teammate Elias. Hayes is third with 52 points and Beaubier, who is 38 points behind Hayden, is all the way back in seventh. But it could have been worse for the defending champion if Elias had finished race two.

Both races were thrillers with the top four together for the majority of both. Leading on the 13th lap, Beaubier was hit from behind by Hayes and the pair tumbled off into the gravel on the exit of turn 10B. Hayden took over at the front, but Elias was with him and with a few laps to go the former world champion took over and held on to win by 0.343 of a second.

Jake Gagne rode the Broaster Chicken/Roadrace Factory Yamaha R1 to third and his first career Superbike podium. Fourth place and top Bazzaz Superstock 1000 rider was Italian Claudio Corti, the HSBK Aprilia rider coming out on top of an epic battle with Wheels In Motion/Motosport.com/Meen Motorsports’ Josh Herrin, Latus Motors Racing’s Bobby Fong and MotoEverything/DieselOps Racing’s Taylor Knapp.

Cycle World Suzuki’s Hayden Gillim ended up eighth with Team Rabid Transit’s Sheridan Morais and Millennium Technologies/KWR’s Kyle Wyman rounding out the top 10.

In race two Beaubier wasn’t to be denied, the Californian battling with his teammate Hayes for the duration with Hayden lurking in their shadow. Elias was with the three until running through the grass in the esses, first falling back and then starting to reel the lead trio back in. But things went bad for the Spaniard on the 14th lap as he crashed out of fourth place in turn six.

Beaubier fought off Hayes’s challenge to win by .415 of a second with Hayden a close third. It was the 12th Superbike win of Beaubier’s career, which puts him in a tie with MotoAmerica rider representative Doug Chandler for 14th on the all-time list.

Fourth place went to Herrin, the Georgian taking top Bazzaz Superstock 1000 honors in the process as it was his turn to head the pack of Corti, Fong and Gagne across the line. Gillim and Morais rounded out the top 10.