Courtesy of  The DailyJournal.com

Being a professional motorcycle racer is tough enough, but being one of the youngest among the AMA riders and being a female makes what Elena Myers has accomplished even more impressive.

Myers, 17, became the first woman to ever win an AMA event when she took the checkered flag on May 15 last year at Infineon Raceway in California. This year, she recently finished fifth in the SuperSport West standings despite missing two races with a broken wrist. She’ll finish he 2011 campaign this weekend at New Jersey Motorsports Park.

Myers won’t be racing for points since her class is divided into East and West, but she’s anxious to get out and improve on her eighth-place finish in the race she started in Millville last year.

“It’s a fun track and last year I didn’t perform as well as I would have hoped,” Myers said. “This year, it’s been a work in progress and I hope to do well and I’m going to go all out.

“I just want to get experience at all the tracks, and it would be terrible to think that my season is ending in July.”

The California native was signed as a Team Hammer development rider at 12-years-old and she already had four years of experience at that point. At age 16, she obtained her AMA license and made her series debut at Daytona International Raceway in March 2010.

After winning at Infineon, she wound up finishing second overall in the SuperSport West point standings. But Myers is focused on continuing to excel and hopefully move up through the ranks.

“I don’t think that changes anything, I still want to win every single weekend,” Myers said about her win at Infineon.

The SuperSport class in which Myers races is designed as a developmental class and riders can’t be older than 21. But having success at such a young age is still special.

She also feels that being a female rider has its advantages and disadvantages.

“It’s definitely hard, physically,” Myers said. “Not being as strong as a male, but I’m small and I’m light, so I can get off the turns pretty quickly.”

Off the track, Myers says she’s in a good position as a young female rider.

“I see it being more of an advantage than a disadvantage,” Myers said. “It certainly helps get sponsors and publicity.”

But Myers is far from being a novelty at the track. Proof Myers is the real deal is that she was recently afforded the opportunity to ride a Suzuki MotoGP bike during a test day at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. The Suzuki GSV-R prototype was the one piloted by Alvaro Bautista in the MotoGP series, which is the highest level of motorcycle racing in the world.

“It was incredible, it was the best bike I’ve ever ridden, times 10,” Myers said. “It accelerates much better, it was twice the horsepower and weighs 40 pounds less, and the brakes are just phenomenal. I got the thing up to 190 mph.”

Myers said reaching MotoGP is her ultimate goal, but she plans on running in the SuperSport class again next year before moving up to the Daytona SportBike class, one below the premier American Superbike class.