In a hopeful sign for fans of the brothers Bostrom, Eric Bostrom reportedly posted the fourth-fastest time at this week’s AMA Superbike test at California Speedway in Fontana, California. Though still some distance behind the dominant Yoshimura Suzuki of Mat Mladin, Eric was quite close on the pace of teammate Neil Hodgson, running 1:25.4 to Hodgson’s 1:25.38 (Mladin’s best time was a 1:24.4).
After a lackluster performance last year on his factory-supported Ducati 999, Eric has spent the early part of the 2005 season in the shadow of Hodgson’s brilliant performance. While Hodgson rode the wheels off his bike and posted competitive times at tracks he had never ridden before, Eric seemed to struggle to make the Ducati work for him, and the result has been performances that display little of the native talent we all know the younger Bostrom possesses.
Will this show of speed at Fontana mark a return to competitiveness for the young Californian? It is probably too soon to say, but it will be interesting to see how he performs at the next AMA Superbike race at Barber Motorsports Park later this month.
