It seems like not much more excitement can be packed into Bridgestone Canadian Superbike Championship weekends, but every round more and more stories are left on the cutting room floor by the time Sunday comes and goes.
From the major headlines that require a bit more detail, to the countless hidden gems that never crack the spotlight, here are some added notes from the fourth round of the 2024 season at Atlantic Motorsport Park.
Sport Bike teens make Superbike impression
Bumping up to the feature Superbike class on a lesser-displacement, Sport Bike-spec machine is always a challenge. Admittedly, it’s not as tall of a task at AMP as other venues, where horsepower is at less of a premium around the twisty 2.5 km rollercoaster, but it’s still difficult to battle it out with full litre-bikes at any circuit.
Apparently, Philip DeGama-Blanchet and Andrew Van Winkle didn’t get that memo.
DeGama-Blanchet put on a show in changing conditions on Saturday, climbing up the field on a damp but drying track and putting his Vass Performance Kawasaki fifth in the feature category. Not only did the 16-year-old latch onto the lead group at one point, but he also set the fastest lap of the race on two consecutive occasions as he ran with Alex Dumas, Ben Young, and Jordan Szoke in the battle for second.
Not to be outdone, however, the 17-year-old Van Winkle managed to match that feat with a fifth-place finish in scorching conditions on Sunday, charging through the pack on his FD Racing Suzuki in what his first ever Pro Superbike race.
Cyr continues family legacy with breakthrough weekend
Fast families aren’t entirely uncommon in CSBK, with historic examples like the Duhamel’s (Yvon, Miguel, and Mario) and Munroe’s (Dave and Don), to more recent cases like the O’Leary’s (Austin and Jacob) and Bauer’s (Dylan and Jordon).
Very few have spanned three generations with as much success as the Cyr family, however, and Mavrick moved the benchmark even further in Shubenacadie.
The 19-year-old captured his first pro CSBK victory with a dominant showing in Sport Bike race one, joining his father Jean-Francois and grandfather Bob on the family tree of winners. While Bob’s success came pre-CSBK, leaving only Mavrick and J-F as a father-son duo in the national record books, the original champion of the family cannot be ignored.
Mavrick will still have some work to do to catch his dad, though, as they each sit on one Sport Bike victory but J-F owns a Superbike win as well, while the elder Cyr also has ten pro CSBK podiums to Mavrick’s three.
Laflamme continues his rapid climb up amateur ranks
Zaim Laflamme would hardly be the first rider to graduate classes mid-season, but few have done so with as much immediate success as the 22-year-old.
After racking up eight podiums in his first 12 national Lightweight races spanning 2023 and the start of 2024, Laflamme made the decision to move to a larger Triumph middleweight machine at round three, and it’s safe to say he made the right call.
Laflamme has scored four podiums in six races split across the Amateur Superbike and Amateur Sport Bike divisions and just took his debut national victory in Sport Bike race one at AMP, beating championship leader Serge Boyer.
The Longueuil, Quebec native is already up to fourth in the Sport Bike championship and just 18 points away from third, the cutoff that would force him to join the pro ranks in 2025 only six rounds into his CSBK career.
Ives’ perfect weekend ramps up Lightweight title fight
After Laflamme left the Lightweight class and championship leader Ryan Beattie opened up a 63-point advantage, it would have been easy for him to put one hand on the amateur trophy.
Instead, Baillie Ives has put all the pressure on his younger counterpart.
The home favourite out of Brookfield, Nova Scotia took pole position and won both races to earn a perfect 54 points in AMP, cutting his deficit to the absent Beattie to just nine points with four races remaining.
Ives had to work hard to make it happen, too, putting together one of the most spectacular comebacks in series history in race one as he started from the pit lane and carved his way through the field to win by 1.5 seconds over veteran pro Gary McKinnon.
Tache’s double opens up four-rider Twins showdown
The second season of the Twins division has seen Vincent Wilson run away with the amateur ranks, but the pro split of the Pro-AM class has been anything but predictable.
Craig Atkinson swept the opening round, before J.P. Tache and Atkinson split round two. Both were then absent for Jodi Christie’s sweep in round three, before Tache returned to win both races in round four.
All that means is that Dallas Reynolds, the ultra-consistent Aprilia rider who has podiumed in every race, has escaped with the championship lead with two rounds left to go, but with only 60 points covering the top four riders that also features Justin Marshall.
All of Reynolds, Atkinson, Tache, and Marshall are expected to be in attendance at the final two rounds, leaving a number of different opportunities for each rider to capture the crown in what is likely the most wide-open title fight of 2024.
