Yamaha Motor Australia press release:

Luke Clout turned in his best supercross performance of the season so far with a hard charging ride to second place on board his Factory Serco Yamaha YZ250F at round three of the Australian Supercross championship in Adelaide.

Competing in the SX2 (250cc) class at Wayville Showgrounds in South Australia, Clout turned it up a notch on the weekend, posting fast laps in qualifying, winning his heat race and even taking down a few of the MX1 big dogs in the entertaining dash for cash, one lap shootout.

But championships aren’t won during shootouts or heat races, so Clout kept his mind on the job and prepared himself for the 15 lap 250cc main event later in the night.

When the gate dropped, all hell broke loose in the opening half a lap that saw riders go down in a big pile up on the finish line jump. Clout somehow avoided the carnage and found himself well-placed near the front of the pack in second place.

Despite the crash, the three heavy hitters of the class in Clout, Jackson Richardson and US import, Jimmy Decotis, all steered clear of the mess and found themselves locked into battle as the race settled down.

Clout made his way to the front and tried to break free as the US rider was ranging up on his back wheel. He was able to hold him at bay for several laps as the trio stretched out their lead. But with less than a handful of laps remaining, Decotis found a way past Clout and charged for the finish.

To his credit, Clout never let the US rider out of his sight and three seconds separated the pair at the end of the 15 lap event.

“I’m satisfied with how I rode tonight. I wasn’t really happy with how things went at the previous round, so it was important to bounce back here in Adelaide and get a good result.

“I would love to have won but I gave it everything I had, Jimmy was just able to sneak by me near the end and hold his lead until the finish but I will take some confidence from this and know that I will be challenging him again at the next round,” Clout ends.

The news wasn’t as good for team mate Jed Beaton who was part of the first lap mayhem and went down heavily damaging his hand and his bike and therefore unable to finish the race.

Beaton looked much more in tune with the track this weekend and took his best qualifying position of the series so far as well as an encouraging ride in his heat race. Beaton will have his hand looked at during the week and is hopeful of a return to racing at the next round.

“I got a good start and was in the top five when someone in front of me didn’t make one of the jumps cleanly and I jumped into the back of them,” Beaton starts. “Because it was lap one and the field was close together, after I fell, I got hit a few times and as a result my hand and shoulder is pretty sore and my clutch lever and perch were broken on the bike.

“I felt much better today and while this isn’t great, I know things are improving and this was just a racing incident.”

Round four of the Australian Supercross Championship returns to Queensland on November 21 at Jimboomba. For more information on the series, www.australiansupercrosss.com.au. To follow the Serco Yamaha team on social media www.facebook.com/sercoyamaha or @sercoyamaha.