Tremblay secures Sport Bike pole at AMP

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Category: CSBK News

Published on Friday, July 21, 2023 13:56 EDT

Written by Cam Bickle

Sebastien Tremblay will start from pole position for the first time as a Suzuki rider, as the weekend favourite outlasted a chaotic final few minutes of qualifying in the Liqui Moly Pro Sport Bike class.

The 2021 champion led most of the 20-minute session aboard his Turcotte Performance machine, and at one point by a comfortable margin behind his 1:09.767 lap time, but that gap began to shrink as the clock ran out and track conditions improved. 

A number of riders would trade fast laps as they inched towards Tremblay, but ultimately it wasn’t enough for any of them as he escaped with his sixth career Pro Sport Bike pole, enough to move him into the top-ten all-time.

His closest challenger would wind up being Matt Simpson, who sat second for much of the period before getting displaced as low as fifth, only to then restore his Blackstock Motorsports Yamaha to second place in the final minute, 0.309 seconds off pole.

It would prove to be a crucial lap for the championship runner-up, as he wound up just 0.063 seconds clear of title leader David MacKay, and in the process trimmed a single point off his season deficit to close the gap to just eleven points.

MacKay will be happy to escape alongside Simpson, however, after he also swapped positions numerous times late on. The ODH Snow City Cycle Kawasaki rider sat outside the top-five for most of the day before climbing to second, settling for the final front-row grid spot after Simpson’s late heroics.

The lead trio will enjoy a slight cushion over the rest of the pack entering race one on Saturday, but the front isn’t as dispersed as usual, with less than a second covering the top-six riders.

Brad Macrae will lead that group and the start of the second row, putting his Colron Excavating Yamaha fourth in the final moments, while Connor Campbell briefly sat inside the top-three before fading to fifth on his B&T MacFarlane/Kubota Kawasaki, just 0.001 seconds clear of John Laing on his Vass Performance Kawasaki.

There will also be a different name starting from pole position in the combined Bickle Racing Pro Twins class, as teenager Andrew Van Winkle ended veteran Jeff Williams’ perfect run atop the new category.

Both Van Winkle and Williams ran competitively amongst the larger Sport Bike machines, but the 16-year-old managed to find a slight advantage aboard his FD Racing Suzuki, completing a top time of 1:12.112 to qualify 0.209 seconds ahead of his Williams Paving Aprilia rival, earning his first ever national pole position. 

The full schedule for Saturday and Sunday’s pro races can be found on the series’ official website at CSBK.ca.