AMA Pro American Superbike Championship point leader Mat Mladin will not race in the Tornado Nationals AMA Pro Road Racing event this weekend at Heartland Park Topeka, in Topeka, Kansas. In fact, Mladin has already left the area and is headed home to Southern California, according to Rockstar Makita Suzuki Team Manager Don Sakakura. In the meantime, AMA Pro Racing officials and track staff have worked throughout Wednesday and Thursday to make improvements based on riders’ feedback, including moving large sections of concrete walls. “He [Mladin] has left,” Sakakura told Roadracingworld.com Thursday evening. “At this point it looks like he will not ride. We will be issuing a press release through Suzuki in the morning, but right now I’d rather not say anything else.” Earlier in the day, when he stopped riding after just two laps of unofficial practice, Mladin declined an interview with Roadracingworld.com, but Sakakura said, “He feels that there are several spots where there is inadequate run-off room with too many solid objects to hit.” Mladin wasn’t alone in his concern regarding the safety of the newest AMA Pro Racing venue. His teammates Tommy Hayden and Blake Young also found themselves forced into making a tough decision: Should they sit out and face losing points, money and possibly fans or should they race on a track they feel has several safety issues? “The wall on the front stretch moves out three or four feet at you,” said Young, referring to an offset section of wall on rider’s right halfway down the front straightaway that suddenly narrows its width. “And coming over the crest of the [Turn One Alpha] hill, yeah, they moved a big section of wall out, but who cares? There’s a huge drainage field behind it. Take your pick. You want to hit a wall or land in a 25-foot drop-off drainage ditch? “I don’t know. There’s some things I have to sleep on and think about.” Hayden begrudgingly said he planned to race, but when asked for further comment, he said, “I’d rather not cast anymore negativity on the sport than everyone else already has.” Former Superbike World Champion Neil Hodgson, however, said he had no problem racing at Heartland Park Topeka, as long as it stays dry. “It’s certainly not the best,” said Hodgson. “I wouldn’t like to ride it in the wet, to be quite honest. That would be a bit scary, just because there’s a few dangerous places that would be even more so in the wet, that first section going over the front stretch and the square edge [offset wall on the front straight] and that lot. Freak accidents can always happen. I feel pretty safe there in the dry, but in the wet it would be pretty sketchy.”