CSBK By the Numbers: Round 2 at Grand Bend

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Category: CSBK News

Published on Friday, June 16, 2023 10:52 EDT

Written by Cam Bickle

The second round of the 2023 Bridgestone Canadian Superbike Championship season brought a pair of huge championship swings this weekend, and even more history amongst the pro ranks. 

Below are just a few of the key numbers from a dramatic round two at the Grand Bend Motorplex. 

Another Superbike drought ends

After race one at Shannonville brought an end to Yamaha’s podium drought in the GP Bikes Pro Superbike class, race two in Grand Bend concluded what was a much longer absence for Honda.

For the first time in over seven seasons, a CBR1000RR rider stepped onto a feature class podium when Chris Pletsch put his Stratford Cycle Centre Honda in second place behind winner Alex Dumas – a streak of 2,858 days, going all the way back to former champion Jodi Christie at the 2015 season finale. 

The result also means five manufacturers have sat on the podium thus far in 2023, already the most since 2015 when the same five brands appeared. Amongst the seven active constructors, Aprilia (2016) now moves to the second-longest drought, while Ducati is still left chasing their first podium since 1995. 

Superbike unpredictability continues

It may not seem like this Superbike season has seen much parity, given that familiar faces Alex Dumas and Ben Young have shared all four wins. Look behind them, though, and it’s a much different picture.

Race two in Grand Bend brought two new podium finishers in Chris Pletsch and Trevor Dion, meaning seven different faces have taken home trophies in the first four races, the most since 2014 and only the third time that’s happened since 2001. 

In fact, only twice have more riders scored podiums in a Superbike season – eight in 2002, and the record of nine in 1992. With a perennial frontrunner in Trevor Daley still chasing his first rostrum of the year, 2023 is almost guaranteed to be one of the three most unpredictable seasons ever in terms of podium finishers. 

BMW’s historic streak comes to a close

The world was very different in May 2010; old Yankee Stadium had just been demolished, Iron Man 2 was dominating the box office, and Eminem was battling Usher atop the music charts. That, and Mike Ferreira finishing fifth as the top BMW at the CSBK opener in ICAR. 

Over an entire decade later, BMW will again leave a CSBK race empty-handed, having missed the podium for the first time in 88 races at Grand Bend, a stretch spanning 4,761 days. 

Far and away the longest streak of all time (Suzuki’s active run sits second at 23 races), BMW amassed 54 wins, 130 podiums, 44 pole positions, and nine championships during that run, defining an entire era of Canadian racing. 

To put the streak into even more context, championship leader Alex Dumas was still just seven years old when BMW bagged their first podium in 2010, meaning the Suzuki rider will likely have seen the Motorrad’s absence for one of the first times in his entire life. 

The race to victory #12

By splitting the second round in Grand Bend, both Ben Young and Alex Dumas managed to reach eleven career wins in the feature class, setting up a mad dash to see who can reach 12 first.

That number is important, of course, because only five riders have thus far ever reached that mark. It will take 13 to earn an outright spot in the top-five of all time, but even tying names like Michel Mercier and Don Munroe for fourth will be an incredible feat for either rider, and one they each will be hoping to get to first. 

With seven races still to go in 2023, there’s a chance one of them could even catch Pascal Picotte for third all-time at 16 wins, though another season would surely put both within reach. 

It will take a remarkable run for anyone to ever catch Jordan Szoke’s record of 78 (and possibly counting), but Steve Crevier’s second-best total of 26 – once thought of as untouchable – could soon be under threat from both Young and Dumas in the near future, assuming their spirited rivalry goes on for at least a couple more seasons.

Future burns bright again in Grand Bend

Race one at Grand Bend in 2022 produced at the time the second-youngest podium ever, where a 29-year-old Ben Young beat 19-year-old Alex Dumas and 20-year-old Trevor Dion.

Well, it took just one calendar year for the Motorplex to one-up themselves. Sunday’s race two became the new second-youngest podium of all-time, as Dumas and Dion – still just 20 and 21 years old, respectively – were joined by a 26-year-old Chris Pletsch, averaging the entire podium out at just 22 years old.

Only the trio of Brett McCormick, Kevin Lacombe, and Chris Peris at Shannonville in 2008 was younger, a podium skewed heavily by a 17-year-old McCormick, proving the youth movement is alive once again in the Superbike class.