Aaron Morris dominates Masters of Morgan Park
It’s fair to say that the Maxima BMW team hasn’t quite exactly had the start to its 2019 Australian Superbike Championship (ASBK) season that the squad had hoped for.
As a result, the Victorian based team decided to use the Pirelli Masters of Morgan Park race meeting – hosted by The Motorcycle Sportsmen of QLD – as a ‘shake down’ test ahead of the fourth round of the ASBK series which takes place at the Queensland circuit on the first weekend of July.
However, due to both Glenn Allerton and Ted Collins being injured at The Bend, the team enlisted 27-year-old Aaron Morris to step in and give the Next Gen Motorsports team some feedback.
The weekend saw Morris, who has previously raced in the Australian Superstock 600, Supersport and Superbike Championship, faced with the task of learning the technical Morgan Park layout, as well as a new bike and team.
The weekend proved positive which has given the team a good direction for the upcoming ASBK round. According to Morris, who dominated races one, two and three, from pole, the biggest hurdle of the weekend was getting his head around the 2.967km circuit, which is not the easiest track to learn.
For reference, the lap record at Morgan Park is 1min12.645s put down by Troy Herfoss on his way to victory at the 2.1-kilometre circuit last year on the Penrite Honda. Cru Halliday set the qualifying record there in 2017 at 1min12.808s on the YRT YZF-R1M.
Morris got down to a best of 1min14.744s during his time on the bike at the circuit over the weekend. Glenn Allerton did not race the BMW at Morgan Park last year but the team’s young Superbike rider Ted Collins recorded a best of 1min14.777s on his way to a pair of top-ten finishes.
Aaron Morris
“Firstly I would like to thank both Wayne and Shane for giving me the call to fill in for both Glenn and Ted. It’s been a great few days, While the circuit has been challenging to learn, the Maxima BMW S 1000RR has been great to ride. Every change we have made to the bike has been a positive change and it’s a credit to Shane and Wayne in terms of how they work and understand what I’m asking for. On top of that, hats off to the Pirelli tyres, as the tyres handle this circuit extremely well. With twelve months off a Superbike, fitness wasn’t my strong point. Once again, I would like to thank both Wayne and Shane for having me over the weekend.”
Wayne Hepburn – Maxima BMW Team Manager
“Overall, we could not have asked for any more in terms of what Aaron has done over these last three and a half days. It was always going to be an unknown heading into this test and Aaron has quite simply impressed me with his overall speed and feedback which he has been able to give us. We are planning to have Glenn and Ted fit enough to test later at Morgan Park in June, if fit enough. However, for the time being it has been an absolute pleasure having Aaron on board with us here. I would like to thank Aaron for his time and professional valuable input.”
