2006 Australian Superbike Championship (YMF Loan)

Report (Shaun Geronomi)

Former North Coast and now Sydney resident, Shaun Geronimi, made a successful debut with the Sydney Mesh Racing/Yamaha Team’s 2006 YZF-R6 in the YMF Loans Australian Supersport Championship at a sunny but windy Eastern Creek International Raceway, April 7-9.

After bouncing back from a disappointing qualifying performance, Shaun lies fifth overall in the championship going into round two in Western Australia.

Suffering from niggling setup problems early in qualifying, Shaun struggled with gearing and tyre selection problems in the opening practice session on Saturday morning, after only having two days to prepare the new bike for the meeting.

Further setup problems in the second session thwarted any attempt to qualify as well as he’d hoped, finishing 12th on the grid.

Qualifying was dominated by the all new Yamaha YZF-R6, filling all four positions on the front row of the grid with Yamaha Racing Team’s Jamie Stauffer claiming pole position.

Having found the cause of Saturday’s problems, the team had Shaun in a positive mood come Sunday morning.

“It’s a new day today and I’m confident I can run with the leaders,” said Shaun prior to the start of race one held in front of a healthy crowd.

Race one was soon red flagged after an incident involving Judd Greedy (Honda) and Adam Ferguson (Honda) resulted in a four-lap restart sprint to the finish.

Prior to the red flag incident, Shaun had been stuck behind Ferguson, a dual Australian champion who is notoriously hard to pass.

Lucky to be unaffected by the incident, Shaun was able to take his place on the grid for the restart.

Shaun got the holeshot and was just pipped by Jamie Stauffer into turn one, and gave racing room to Jason O’Halloran on another Yamaha YZR-R6.

Honda rider Glenn Allerton was the next to force his way by, but Shaun immediately re-passed him.

Allerton's factory Honda proved too fast in a straight line, however, and Shaun eventually finished fifth, securing 16 valuable championship points.

Shaun was pleased with his performance: “I know I can run with the leaders now”.

After making another great start in the second race, Shaun managed to stay with the leaders for the first few turns.

Qualifying problems, however, had resulted in Shaun doing too many hard laps early in the weekend, using up the allowed tyres.

Consequently the tyres were past their best, so Shaun brought the bike home in a solid seventh position and second privateer home.

“I got a really good start but when I went into turn three the rear just came around – I actually thought I had a flat tyre.

“The field sort of gapped me after that, then at turn eight it did it again. From then on, the tyre was pretty consistent until the end of the race.”

Shaun now sits in second position in the Privateer’s Championship with a total of 40 points.

The next round of the championship takes place at Perth’s Barbagallo Raceway on May 26-28, a track that Shaun has previously held lap records in the 250 production and 250 GP classes.

Shaun would like to thank all his sponsors that have made this weekend possible; Yamaha, Sydney Mesh and Steel, Dunlop, Sportsbike tyre warmers, Radar’s shock service & Dyno, Penske, Elaine’s world of lights, Procycles, Motul, RK Chains and Racers Edge.

2006 YMF Loan Australian Supersport Championship Series Points (After Round 1): 1 J Stauffer (Yamaha) 51, 2 J O’Halloran (Yamaha) 38, 3 G Allerton 35, 4 J Crowe (Yamaha) 33, 5 S Geronimi (Yamaha) 30

2006 YMF Loans Australian Supersport Championship Series Points (After Round 1 – Privateers): 2 J Crowe (Yamaha) 51, 2 S Geronimi (Yamaha) 40, 3 M Kelly 34, C Seaton 32