Mladin aiming for 60th AMA Superbike win at VIR -ozzy go- amasuperbike.com

Yoshimura Suzuki’s Mat Mladin could reach a major milestone this
weekend when the AMA Superbike Championship presented by
Parts Unlimited comes to Virginia International Raceway (VIR) in
Alton, Va., on Aug. 17-19 for the AMA Suzuki Big Kahuna
Nationals. Mladin, the six-time AMA Superbike Champion from
Australia, has the opportunity to score his 60th-career AMA
Superbike victory.

Legendary Motorcycle Hall of Famer Fred Merkel set the standard
in the mid-1980s when he tallied 20 AMA Superbike victories. In
1998 Miguel Duhamel eclipsed Merkel’s mark to become the all-
time wins leader. In 2004 Mladin passed Duhamel to take over
the title of all-time AMA Superbike wins leader and in the last
three years Mladin has racked up an amazing 59 wins and now
sits on the verge of cracking the 60-win barrier.

Mladin closed to within 17 points of series leader and defending
champ Ben Spies with a double victory in the most recent rounds
at Mid-Ohio Sports Car. Even though the championship is very
much up for grabs as the series moves to VIR, Mladin says he’s
focused simply on winning races.

“Honestly I'm not thinking about the points,” Mladin said. “If I win
this championship, then we've done a really good job. We've
given a lot of points away this year. At Daytona, and Utah, I
made a silly mistake and crashed out of the lead. So we've given
up a few this year. So to be in the position we're in is very good,
anyway. To win the next five races would honestly mean a lot
more to me than winning the championship. To win 13 races in a
year, that'd be pretty cool. It'd be one of my better years, that's
for sure, that I've ever had, and being 35 and over the hill, not
too bad.”

If history is any indication the championship could draw even
tighter at VIR. Mladin has swept VIR’s Big Kahuna Doubleheader
the last two years and calls the Virginia circuit one of his
favorites.

Spies is still the series leader, but he realizes that his Yoshimura
Suzuki teammate is on a roll and he needs to step it up at VIR.

“It's going to be tough,” Spies said. “At Virginia last year before I
smashed my hand up, we had some pretty speed there. It's
going to come down to crash or win. ozzy go to the full story