Graves Motorsports racer Ben Bostrom won the 2008 AMA Supersport championship with a gutsy second-place finish in the series’ final round at Laguna Seca in Monterey, Calif. on Sunday, Sept. 28. The championship is Bostrom’s third career title (to go with his Supermoto and Superbike honors) and the first in the Supersport class for Yamaha’s YZF-R6 since 2006. Teammate Josh Herrin made a strong run to the podium to finish third and wind up the season solidly in fifth.
Arriving in Monterey, Bostrom needed only a 17th place finish in Supersport to win the title. But after earning a point for taking the pole on Saturday, he needed only finish 19th in Sunday’s finale. But “B Boz” was more motivated than that, leaping to the early lead before letting Martin Cardenas past and tucking into second. With teammate Herrin protecting his flank in third, Bostrom was at ease on the R6 and right where he needed to be until a crash by Nicky Moore brought out the red flag after nine laps. The drama built as the race continued a short while later, with Bostrom now slotted into third behind Cardenas and Blake Young, as Herrin battled up from ninth after a less-than-stellar re-start. Bostrom’s practiced race-craft ultimately played dividends as Cardenas ran wide on the last lap, handing second to the likeable Californian.
“My strategy was to finish 10th, but my R6 can’t go that slow!” Bostrom grinned afterwards. “Seriously, the boys at Graves are like a family and the bike is phenomenal. It makes me so stoked to ride and race it!” Yamaha road racing team manager Tom Halverson added, “Ben meshed with the R6 so well this year – it did everything he wanted it to do, and that inspired a lot of confidence in him. I also want to congratulate Chuck Graves for putting together a great group of guys to support Ben and Josh. They bounced back from adversity in the middle of the season and got it all together at the end.”
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