American rider Ben Bostrom will have double the duties this coming weekend at the US GP at Laguna Seca, as he’ll ride as a wild card in MotoGP with the LCR Honda team, alongside Toni Elias. Bostrom will also be honoring his commitments with the Jordan Suzuki AMA team, riding the Suzuki GSX-R1000 in the AMA Pro Superbike races held in conjunction with MotoGP’s first US stop of the season.
“Words can’t express how excited I am to get this amazing opportunity to race on my home track in front of the whole world,” said Bostrom. “I have to thank Michael Jordan Motorsports and American Suzuki for allowing this to happen. The collaboration between Lucio, LCR and the MJM team has been terrific. I’m going to get on the GP bike and put it as close to the front as possible. Then I’m going to hop on my Jordan Suzuki bike and try to create even more magic.”
2011 marks the second year in a row that LCR Honda has tapped a Jordan Suzuki rider for MotoGP duty, as Roger Lee Hayden filled-in for an injured Randy de Puniet at last year’s US GP. Unfortunately for Hayden, the jump to a GP bike was a bit too far, and the American finished 11th out of 12 finishing racers. Hopefully Bostrom will have better luck, and from LCR’s perspective, he certainly can’t do any worse than Toni Elias has this season.
“The U.S. GP takes place at one of the most spectacular racetracks in the world,” said CEO of LCR Lucio Cecchinello. “Because of the great relationship between our team and Michael Jordan Motorsports, we decided to invite one of Laguna Seca’s most successful riders to compete for us in the race: Ben Bostrom. I’d like to offer many thanks to the Michael Jordan Motorsports team for the great collaboration and the amazing support.”
LCR Honda is one of the few teams in the MotoGP paddock that really understands the value of localizing its racing effort, as the company changes livery at certain races to accommodate new and existing sponsors (the team will run its Rizoma livery at Laguna Seca this year). It would seem LCR has extended that idea to riders, at least for the US round, which makes for some very interesting food for thought on how to run a GP team…especially if Bostrom shows some good results. Certainly none of the American fans will mind having four countrymen on the grid come Sunday.
Source: Michael Jordan Motorsports & LCR Honda
Comments