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POSITIVE DAY AT DAYTONA FOR WESTBY, ULRICH, AND MYERS

March 16, 2012

DAYTONA BEACH, FL (March 16, 2012) – M4 Broaster Chicken Suzuki's Dane Westby secured a second row grid position for Saturday's 71st running of the Daytona 200 following another day of displaying impressive race pace as he prepared for the arduous contest.

Westby hustled his GSX-R600 Daytona SportBike around the intimidating Daytona International Speedway circuit with a best time of 1:51.031 to qualifying seventh overall.

The Oklahoman's confidence continued to soar as he matched up with his fellow competitors during qualifying.

He explained, "I ran with some of the guys and finally got in the draft of about five riders to see what the race would be like. I came out on top of all the individual battles and my plan is to methodically chip away in the race in that manner. There are some other fast guys but it's a long race and I feel I have a good chance.

"I know I have the ability to win. I'm going to go into the race with that mindset and just hammer away and do my best."

SuzukiScoopFans Sportbike TrackGear.com M4 Suzuki's Elena Myers ran in contention for the win throughout the 10-lap AMA Pro SuperSport season opener.

Myers made a pre-race statement by posting the fastest time in the morning's qualifying, which moved her up to third on the combined grid at 1:52.822.

She proceeded to run near the front of the pack, crossing the stripe in second position on multiple occasions, but got balked and subsequently caught out on the final run to the flag and was shuffled down to sixth at the stripe.

"I'm a little disappointed," Myers said. "I was forced to back off a little bit there in the final race to the flag. But we proved that we were right there and there's always tomorrow."

M4 Broaster Chicken Suzuki's Chris Ulrich fought his way to 11th in the AMA Pro Superbike season opener in what was promising outing for the Californian.

Starting from the fourth row after qualifying in 14th with a fast lap of 1:40.544, Ulrich steadily tracked down the group in front of him and ultimately won out in a fight to claim 11th at the checkered flag by a narrow 0.044 second margin.

"It was a hectic first few laps with a lot of bumping and banging," Ulrich said. "My rear tire developed a vibration on the second lap and that had me a little concerned. But we settled in and caught up to the group in front of us. I was able to beat one competitor to the line and felt like we had something for the crew just in front of him too if we had a few more laps.

"It feels good to get a race in and get a good solid result. Last year at this time I wouldn't have been happy with 11th but circumstances change and I'm pretty pleased with this after my injuries last year. It's something we can build upon for tomorrow."

Saturday will feature the Daytona 200 along with the second half of the weekend's Superbike and SuperSport doubleheaders at Daytona International Speedway.

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