After a too-long hiatus from the top of the podium, Josh Waters’ crowning as Australia’s first four-time Superbike Champion was all about setting things right

“Every championship is special, but this one is extra-special, these last few years have been tough.” It’s been seven years between titles – but the story of the first rider to be crowned a four-time Australian Superbike Champion is as much about the previous six years as it is the current one. “So much has happened in life. Seven years is such a long time but it doesn’t feel like it.”

Waters had not long returned from a stint in the UK racing in the British Superbike Championship when Dale Brede launched Team Suzuki Ecstar. The pair linked with Phil Tainton for a fairytale title in 2017 which preceded two leaner years and the eventual withdrawal of Suzuki from the ASBK championship. Waters ran a privateer GSX-R 1000RR in 2020, but the class had transformed and technology ruled.

A stint with Kawasaki and then BMW followed, but Waters had a hunger to fight at the top. “In 2022 I was just really fortunate,” he says. “I was seriously questioning what I should be doing. Those Grand Prix support races changed everything; it wasn’t a championship round but the top guys were there. Wayne (Maxwell) couldn’t compete but the McMartin team sponsors wanted the Ducati V4R on the grid. That bike was winning everything but I felt like it was a big risk… if I didn’t go any good, everyone would have thought I had lost it. It was a good result in the end, three race wins and a lap record!”

Craig McMartin’s team had built a formidable reputation as the team to beat. “Craig and I are very similar with the passion we have for racing. I don’t have to call him every day to check in, we just seem to be on the same page. He was born and raised in a country town like me. He’s an ex-racer, there’s a lot of common ground.”

Waters looked invincible in his debut season with McMartin Racing. “Last year I won the first five races on the trot… there was talk that the Ducati was going to be restricted… but the truth was it was all just happening for me in that moment!”

Just when a fourth title looked in the bag, a series of injuries meant it was impossible for him to battle at the level needed to challenge for the title.

“Troy (Herfoss) was so strong from the mid-season point on. My injury from the Suzuka 8-Hour (where Waters was taken out by another rider) was maybe a lot worse than I had let on. A week before the Phillip Island round last year, my hands weren’t working. It was like I had a dead arm; I couldn’t do anything. Troy was riding really well, so I knew it would be tough. I had also fractured my shoulder on the Wednesday before the Morgan Park round. It hurt like buggery and then when I had the crash at Suzuka, the doctors asked me about this existing shoulder fracture. At the time I thought, ‘Grow some balls, you’re too soft, you only fell off your little dirt bike!’

“You live and you learn. And you learn off the team. If something has gone wrong, you can’t go back and change it. A good team will work out how to not make that mistake again instead of crying about it.”

Season 2024 was about putting those lessons into practice. This time there was no mistake.

Blow by blow

Round one: Phillip Island

Result – 1-1-1  Championship position – 1st

Championship lead – 15.5 points (Harrison Voight)

“I always feel like there is more pressure on me at Phillip Island than anyone else, because I have had good results there in the past. At the start of the year, in any championship, everyone believes they can win. The top riders go into that opening round genuinely believing they are going to win a championship, and I was one of those guys. The track had been resurfaced – but I felt I had a bigger advantage when the track was more slippery. I felt like the resurfacing had closed the field up. I was rapt with how it went, to get that result with the same team, it felt ‘normal’.”

Round two – Sydney Motorsport Park

Result – 2-1 Championship position – 1st

Championship lead – 25.5 points (Cru Halliday)

“Two years in a row we had wet races at SMSP in the dark! It was a bit difficult; we could have made the bike better. It was really slippery but I just tried to ride the bike smart. I don’t actually like riding in the wet – I never hope it’s wet – but I’ve clicked with this bike and I was really happy with how I rode there. I have a lot of confidence in the Ducati, for sure. I never feel like I’m going to go out and dominate just because it’s raining – it’s so different every time – and SMSP is very unique under lights. The key is to establish feel really quickly… maybe I get that from riding at home on the slippery dirt tracks, I don’t know. You have to have full focus and be prepared for anything. 290 down the straight into turn one, the bike is sliding around. Riding in the wet isn’t as physical, but your brain is getting a workout and a half!”

Round three – Queensland Raceway

Result – 3-4 Championship position – 1st

Championship lead – 29.5 points (Halliday)

“QR for Mike Jones is a bit like Phillip Island for me on the Ducati! I had better results there than I had ever had before, but maybe my brain was telling me before the event that the kind of result I had would be good enough, maybe that pushed me to play it safe. I knew I had a bit of a points gap to Mike and that he would be extremely strong at the Queensland rounds. Maybe I could have gone better, but I went with an aim of certain positions that would be the best result for the championship – individual races are important but the championship is what everyone wants.”

Round four – Morgan Park

Result – 4-3 Championship position – 1st

Championship lead – 17 points (Mike Jones)

“Mike made up a bunch of points at the Queensland rounds, like I expected. Morgan Park, it’s that kind of narrow track where you have to hit all your marks. You need to be relaxed and it will happen, but if you’re riding a bit safe because of the changes in surface, you’ll pick up all the negative feelings. You can’t fix that though; there are patches everywhere, the surface is falling apart. Should a Superbike be racing there? I don’t think so. I think the Australian Superbike Championship has outgrown the complex. The runoff – it doesn’t matter if it’s a 300 or a Superbike, bikes seem to get destroyed and people get hurt. But, if we have to go there, we have to go there.”

Round five – Phillip Island

Result – 2-2 Championship position – 1st

Championship lead – 29 points (Jones)

“My focus was on the points lead and the blue bikes. That’s all I was worried about. I’d been quick on the Saturday but I knew Harry (Voight – teammate) would be doing all he could to beat us. We are on the exact same spec bike and Craig puts everything into the preparation. Harry is a great little rider – I feel like I’m riding against the next world champion! That weekend it was a disadvantage starting from pole because they had patched the circuit. The bike just spun off the line. In the wet there was spray everywhere with a lot of people crashing, but Broc (Pearson) rode really, really well. I knew Mike was going backwards and it was an opportunity to pick up more points.”

Round six – One Raceway

Result – 5-2 Championship position – 1st

Championship lead – 26 points (Jones)

“The Shelleys have done a great job on the track but I do wish it was even longer, with a longer straight – it’s still very tight on a Superbike. I do like the ‘bowl’ section and the entire complex is fantastic, a huge improvement. That weekend, though, the circuit was dangerous if you ran off the racing line. You could see that, it was obvious. We were the first championship to ride around that circuit in anger, kind of like The Bend a few years ago. I was chewing the clutch out because of the gearing I wanted to run, so I knew I would be in trouble if there was a restart. And there were two! The first race I caught up to Broc (Pearson). Would I have passed him? I don’t know. But the tall gearing made it really hard on the equipment, especially taking off from the line.”

Round seven – The Bend

Result – 2-1-2 Championship position – 1st

Championship lead – 45 points (Jones)

“In practice and qualifying we worked on our weaknesses from the previous year. In qualifying, Mike got us. He did a great job. Race one, he got me into the second last turn. But it was great being able to watch the first race that night before the races the following day. We made a few changes and although I didn’t want to do anything silly on the Sunday, I wanted to prove to people I could still win. I knew Mike had Troy (Herfoss) for second and the championship wasn’t sewn up – but I was just so happy because I had shown I could fight and win. In the final race, all I had to do was finish, but I was still nervous. If I had crashed I would have picked that bike up and carried it around on my back for 11 laps! We’d all put too much into the year to miss out on the title. I wanted to do a couple of laps to put myself into a safe position. I knew it was Mike who went down on the opening lap, so the pressure was off. The relief I had when I crossed the line was amazing; the weight off my shoulders – a weight I’d put there myself. Three, five and seven year gaps – I was just so happy to be competitive enough to still be able to win. It was such an awesome feeling, pulling up at the end of the straight. Something I’ll never forget.”