Earlier this week we reported how unpredictable the 2020 AFT Singles was. We believe there is not even a hint of a dominant week in, week outr acewinner yet. AFT SuperTwins is far more easy to bet on. The winner is going to be on an Indian FTR750. Four races, four Indian wins, two to Mees two to current #1 Briar Bauman.
Out of the 12 possible podium positions so far in 2020, only one position has been filled by a non-Indian rider, Bryan Smith's third place at the second Indy Mile on the Harley XG750R. That strong finish jumped Smith into the top ten in the standings. He's the only non-Indian in the top ten. Of the other Harley riders, Gauthier is in 11th overall, Vanderkooi is 12th. Yamaha's great hope JD Beach is 13th, Carlile is 16th of the 18 riders in SuperTwins.
Briar Bauman did the double at Indy. His win of the first night of the double-header was the FTR750's 50th AFT win since it was debuted by Joe Kopp at the final round of the 2016 season. Brad Baker won at that fateful season-ender, on a Harley XR750. Since then Harley has won just one elite class race, with Carver, also on an XR750, in Texas in 2017.
Of the other manufacturers, Kawasaki has fared best, notching four wins: 2017 Lima HM and Buffalo Chip with Briar Bauman, and Wiles' Peoria TT victories in 2017 and '18.
In the same time period Yamaha has scored two wins, both the Arizona and Buffalo Chip TTs with JD Beach in 2019.
If we discount the pre-Wrecking Crew Kopp race and just consider the full races from the start of the 2017 season onwards, while the FTR750 was scoring 51 wins the rest of motorcycling has scored just seven between them. That gives the FTR750 a win rate of 87.9%.
GRAND SLAM
Briar's win on Friday night was also notable because he secured the dirt track grand slam, that is winning mile, half-mile, short track and TT. He is just the 17th rider in the sport's history to be credited with a grand slam (according to dairylandclassic.com - who we trust). Bauman is one of only four current riders to have done it, the others being Jake Johnson (who is sitting out the 2020 season after the wild card rules didn't suit him - and we can see why); Jared Mees and Sammy Halbert.
The next AFT round is the Springfield Short Track (for Singles) and Mile for the Twins, this coming weekend.