Alex Dumas got a little boost of confidence back ahead of a pivotal race two on Sunday, leading the final Pro Superbike practice of the weekend in the morning warm-up at Atlantic Motorsport Park.
The reigning champion had a disastrous day on Saturday, crashing out of the lead in race one as rival Ben Young went on to win and take a commanding 26-point championship advantage.
Dumas will be slightly faster than Young heading into race two on Sunday, topping the morning practice with a time of 1:08.496. The Liqui Moly/Fast School Suzuki rider won’t have much of a gap to celebrate, though, pacing Young by just 0.023 seconds ahead of the sixth race of the campaign.
Young will just need to avoid any chaos to escape AMP with a championship lead, but he will also know he can’t afford to be too cautious this afternoon with a hungry group of riders looking for their first career win behind him.
Leading that group into Sunday afternoon will be Michael Leon, who captured his second career Pro Superbike podium on Saturday and continues to enjoy his weekend on the east coast as the third-fastest rider in the warm-up session.
The Royal Distributing BMW veteran was just a half-second clear of the next two riders, who happen to be two more familiar faces in Sebastien Tremblay and Trevor Daley.
Tremblay has slowly ramped up his weekend pace aboard his Turcotte Performance/Pro Cycle Kawasaki, but will need to replicate his morning times if he hopes to avoid another battle outside the top-five.
Daley remained just 1.6 seconds off the fastest time in fifth, but his pace wasn’t entirely reflective as he sorts out some mechanical adjustments to his OneSpeed/Pro Cycle Suzuki in preparation of race two.
The runner-up in Saturday’s race still did not have his setup entirely sorted in race one after a morning crash, but will be back closer to his usual pace on Sunday afternoon – something that poses a major threat to Young and Dumas at the front.
The second feature Pro Superbike race of the weekend is currently scheduled for 3 pm AT (2 pm ET) this afternoon, with a full slate of racing beginning at 1 pm AT.
