Jason Perez, the 2005 AMA Superbike Rookie of the Year, is back in the U.S. after a deal to race in the FIM European Superstock Championship fell through. Perez left for Europe in February, planning to race in the 2006 European Superstock series with HP Racing Suzuki. Perez rode the team’s Pirelli-shod GSX-R1000 racebikes at several tests in Spain and Italy. But by mid-April Perez and the HP team manager still hadn’t agreed to contract terms, and had reached an impasse in negotiations. Perez returned to the United States on Thursday, April 20. Within a week of being home, Perez purchased Aaron Gobert’s 2005 Graves Yamaha YZF-R1; on Thursday Perez worked on getting the bike dialed-in for this weekend’s AMA Superbike race at California Speedway. Perez now plans to race in the entire AMA Series, and he plans to finance his AMA program using club race contingency winnings.