Friday, June 20, 2014

WSBK: Round #7 Pata Honda Race Preview – Misano

Johnathan Rea race action shot

Pata Honda Press Release:

Pata Honda riders Jonathan Rea and Leon Haslam were eighth and eleventh-fastest respectively after today’s two free practice sessions for Sunday’s seventh-round World Superbike championship races at Misano in Italy.

However, while not content with their overall positions on the Friday leaderboard, which was headed by local rider Davide Giugliano, both Pata Honda pilots are quietly satisfied with progress made in today’s two 45-minute sessions.

Rea is 0.6s off Giugliano’s time while Haslam is a further 0.3s away and both British riders are confident of further improvement in tomorrow’s two free practice sessions ahead of Superpole which will determine final grid positions for Sunday’s two 21-lap races at the 4.226km Misano circuit.

Johnathan Rea Pit Row image

Jonathan Rea #65:
- P8

After a couple of difficult rounds at Donington and Sepang, we turned up here with some different engine brake strategies. To be honest, we got off to a slow start developing that and getting some base settings into it this morning. Our position of eighth might not reflect it, but we’re actually making quite good progress. I’m starting to feel like I have a bike that I can push again and I think we’ll make some good steps overnight. I’ve given some good feedback to the guys and I’m actually enjoying riding. It’s a shame we’re not closer to the sharp end, but we reduced the gap to the front quite a lot in the heat of that second session and we need to do the same in the morning. I’m satisfied with our work today but we need to keep pushing.

Leon Haslam race action shot

Leon Haslam #91
- P11

This morning’s session wasn’t ideal and we got a bit interrupted with two red flags in this afternoon’s practice when we had a new tire in the bike. But we found quite a major electronic issue that we couldn’t solve today but it should be quite easy to fix for tomorrow. I’m looking forward to that, even though we’ve still got some way to go. We’re 0.9s off the quickest time and although it’s quite tight we definitely need to make those steps.

Pieter Breddels – Technical Coordinator:

We were quite a bit off with Jonathan’s settings this morning but we made some good steps this afternoon. We’re not there yet, but we’re improving and we have some good plans for tomorrow. We’ve seen some good progress during the day with Leon, too, and he’s not so far away from Jonathan. We’re speaking about some chassis changes for tomorrow and there are some electronics changes required, so we’ll see how those work tomorrow.

Free Practice Results:

1 Davide Guigliano    1m36.370    ITA    DUCATI    Ducati Superbike Team
2 Tom Sykes    1m36.497    GBR    KAWASAKI    Kawasaki Racing Team
3 Marco Melandri    1m36.500    ITA    APRILIA    Aprilia Racing Team
4 Chaz Davies    1m36.636    GBR    DUCATI    Ducati Superbike Team
5 Loris Baz    1m36.661    FRA    KAWASAKI    Kawasaki Racing Team
6 Alex Lowes    1m36.698    GBR    SUZUKI    Voltcom Crescent Suzuki
7 Sylvain Guintoli    1m36.860    FRA    APRILIA    Aprilia Racing Team
8 Jonathan Rea    1m37.024    GBR    HONDA    Pata Honda
9 Eugene Laverty    1m37.149    IRL    SUZUKI    Voltcom Crescent Suzuki
10 Toni Elias    1m37.234    ESP    APRILIA    Red Devils Roma
11 Leon Haslam    1m37.352    GBR    HONDA    Pata Honda

Pata Honda Assen 2014:

For more information: www.patahonda.com

Source : cycleworld[dot]com

No comments:

Post a Comment