Penrite Honda Racing press release:

Penrite Honda Racing’s reigning Australian Superbike champion Troy Herfoss finished third overall in round four of season 2019 at Morgan Park Raceway in Queensland today.

Herfoss qualified in fourth position on Saturday with a 1m13.127s lap-time set in Q2, before recording 4-2 finishes in the pair of hard-fought 16-lap races.

It was an encouraging result for the 32-year-old riding the ER Motorsport-run CBR1000RR SP Fireblade, leading at stages and only falling short of the second race victory by 0.375s.

“It was a really good finish to the weekend, that second race,” stated Herfoss. “This was the hardest weekend I’d had in a long time, so I’m just so happy to close the gap to the championship leader down to 15 points.

“We’ve come out of here mistake-free, put it on the podium and are in a good position leading into Winton. I’m happy with where we’re at for the moment and we will keep working hard to get back on the top step.”

It was a more challenging race-day for Penrite Honda Racing teammate Mark Chiodo after qualifying 10th on the grid at 1m13.693s. He crashed out of race one following a strong start and then salvaged 13th in race two this afternoon for P15 overall.

“We had a small crash on Friday, which put us on the back-foot for Saturday and then today was about getting through the first race to see where we were at,” Chiodo recalled. “But I had a crash on the third lap of race one, so that was disappointing, and race two was a bit frustrating as well. We will now look ahead to Winton.”

Herfoss remains fourth in this year’s championship standings following four of seven rounds, currently 15 points outside of the lead. Meanwhile, Chiodo has dropped to 12th position.

“This was a very tough round for us to begin with, but we chipped away all weekend and pretty much got on top of it towards the end there with Troy,” explained Penrite Honda Racing team manager Shaun Clarke. “His ride in the final race was really good.

“Troy’s in a strong position and is well and truly in the hunt, so we won’t be giving up. Mark experienced a few difficulties this weekend, so the result didn’t really show what he was capable of, but he continues to learn with each round.”

Next on the 2019 Australian Superbike Championship (ASBK) calendar is Winton Motor Raceway in Victoria between 6-8 September. Visit www.asbk.com.au for further information on the series.