The Aftermath – MotoAmerica Twins : Landers Lands #1 – RA#2 2020

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Time after time, Twins Cup never disappoints. Rocco Landers did not disappoint either. It was just about the perfect weekend for the #97 Suzuki rider. Rocco set pole position in qualifying with a 2:27.452. This time was a second faster than the lap record posted by Jackson Blackmon in the previous round. Kaleb De Keyrel was just a hair off Rocco all weekend. KD51 came out of qualifying 2nd with a 2:28.230. Jackson rounded out the 1st row with a 2:30.179.

The weather could not have been better for the race. Nice weather and determined riders only means crazy fast laps and close battles. Rocco got out to an early lead and managed the gap back to De Keyrel the whole time. Kaleb had to deal with Action Jackson for the first half the the race until Jackson would spin out exiting turn 5 retiring the #18 Sv650 from the race. Kaleb De Keyrel put in a late race push, posting a new lap record (2:27.355) in the process, but it was not enough to get Rocco. Landers won the race with a best time of 2:27.479 and .799 lead over Kaleb at the line.

The battle was on for 3rd. Cooper McDonald, Jason Madama, Teagg Hobbs, Hayden Schultz, and Toby Khamsouk went at it. This had to be one of the best battles we’ve ever seen. The amount of passing was something from accident scripture. Chris Parrish was there early on but a blown head gasket forced the vet to limp the Yamaha twin and finished the race in 9th.

All 5 riders made mistakes here and there. Three – four wide in spots. Deep braking passes. This battle had absolutely everything you could want in a race. A mistake by Madama on the last lap took him out of the running. Also on the last lap, Hayden Schultz was close to a high side coming out of turn 5 but managed to save it. You’d think he would was done but Hayden crawled his way back and coming out of the last corner found himself in the draft of Teagg Hobbs; who was currently in 3rd place. Cooper and Toby were just a bit too far behind exiting the final corner to be a factor. Hobbs and Schultz went down to the line with Hayden pulling out of the draft perfectly to secure 3rd place by .016.

After the first two rounds, Kaleb De Keyrel (70 points) leads the championship by 9 points over Rocco Landers (61 points). The series’ next round is at Road Atlanta on July 31st/August 1st but there are some rumors’ about this round being cancelled which would make round 3 at Pittsburgh on August 7th-9th. Either way, I simply cannot wait to see twins cup action again.

This post has already been read 692 times!