Josh Waters wins Hidden Valley opener

ASBK 2023

Round Four – Hidden Valley, Darwin

Superbike Race One

Josh Waters led Glenn Allerton into turn one as Troy Herfoss and Mike Jones gave chase when race one got underway in Darwin just after midday on Saturday. Next was Bryan Staring ahead of Arthur Sissis, Cru Halliday and Broc Pearson.  That order remain unchanged over the course of the opening laps, however the leading four quickly started to break away, running a second a lap quicker than fifth placed Staring.

Little separated the top quartet until around five laps into the race when Josh Waters started to get a buffer over Allerton. The BMW man was then relegated to fourth as both Troy Herfoss and Mike Jones sneaked past, but that trio tripping each other up was allowing Waters to pull away.

Cru Halliday got the better of Staring for fifth on lap seven but by that time he was already six-seconds behind the race leader, and four-seconds behind fourth placed Allerton.

As the race passed the halfway point Waters led Herfoss by two-seconds, the Penrite Honda man still had Mike Jones and Glenn Allerton in close company. That top four were still lapping consistently in the 65s, while the rest of the field had not managed a single lap in the 65s.

Josh Waters started to pass lapped traffic on lap 13 but managed to sneak through without losing too much time. The lap times had started to slow by this stage of proceedings, the leading group no longer in the 65s.

Allerton went up the inside of Jones into turn five to take third place as the contest for second place started to really hot up. With Allerton putting himself between Herfoss and Jones though that did allow the Penrite Honda man to gain a little breathing space.

Further back Cru Halliday had lost positions to Bryan Staring, Anthony West and Arthur Sissis after running off at turn 11.

Waters led by almost two-seconds as they started the last lap but the championship leader buttoned it off on the final lap to take a safe victory.

Behind Waters though the pace had hotted up again with Herfoss and Allerton dipping back into the 65s to deny Mike Jones a podium finish.

Bryan Staring fifth, more than ten-seconds behind the podium finishers but with a few bike lengths over sixth placed Anthony West.

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Arthur Sissis is struggling with a wrist injury but took seventh place ahead of Cru Halliday. The YRT #65 having an incident on lap 12 that cost him around eight-seconds and a few positions.

Waters extends his championship lead over Herfoss to 24-points while Glenn Allerton moved ahead of Cru Halliday into third in the championship chase.

It is an early start on Sunday for race two, 0830 (0900 AEST) before the final 16-lap bout of the triple-header at 1310 (1340 AEST).  The track temperature for race two will likely be 20-degrees cooler than what the riders experienced during race one on Saturday, but the Sunday afternoon race will likely see the same 50-degree temperatures experienced in race one.

Superbike Race One Results

Superbike Championship Points

2023 ASBK Calendar