Copyright 2004, Roadracing World Publishing, Inc.

The September 17-19 AMA Superbike series event at Virginia International Raceway being postponed has inconvenienced many of the teams, riders and assorted personnel who follow and make their living within the series, but few are facing a more difficult situation than Graves Yamaha’s Aaron Gobert.

Gobert, 23, hoped to defend his five-point lead at VIR and win the AMA Superstock Championship, the first of his career. Then the day after the races, he and his girlfriend Melanie Riley planned to fly home to Australia to make the final preparations for their October 6 wedding.

Now, with talk of the VIR event being rescheduled for October 8-10, Gobert is faced with a choice between the wedding and the Championship.

“We’re getting married on an island. There’s like 35 of us going to this island, and at the moment there’s only going to be 33, because Mel and I aren’t going,” Gobert told Roadracingworld.com Wednesday. “We have to wait and see what happens, but we can’t get married if we’re in America. The problem is, the time of year it is and everything, nothing’s refundable. I’m gonna have to pay for two weddings.”

Although he realizes it may not be completely fair to Tommy Hayden and Jamie Hacking, his two closest challengers, Gobert would like to see the final race cancelled.