The third-round of the World Superbike championship this weekend has been a challenging outing for Michael van der Mark and Sylvain Guintoli at Aragon, Spain.
Over the weekend the team strived to improve and find the optimum setting for the Honda CBR1000RR Fireblade SP around the 5.077km circuit.
In the first of two 18-lap races, van der Mark was forced to retire due to a small technical problem on the tenth lap. The second race saw the SBK rookie make a gallant attack moving up from his starting grid position in 11th to sixth place, but on the last lap had to settle with eighth.
Meanwhile van der Mark’s teammate Sylvain Guintoli finished race one within the top-ten taking ninth place after making his way forward from his qualifying position in 14th. During the second installment he had made his way up to tenth but crashed out of the running on the sixth lap after loosing the front.
The team will now take and analyse all the data collected from each session this weekend in preparation for its home race at Assen, the Netherlands next weekend 17-19 April.
Michael van der Mark - DNF - 8th
Michael van der Mark I felt quite confident going into race one today, but I knew I had some work to do starting from 11th. My lap times were getting better andbetter and I was improving on each lap, but unfortunately we had a small technical problem, which meant I had to finish the race early. Race two was better, I managed to get up to speed quickly and movefurther forward towards the front. I’m happy to leave here with some points and we now have some work to do before Assen next weekend,where I hope we have some better results.
Sylvain Guintoli - 9th DNF
Sylvain Guintoli This weekend we have been working hard to find the right settings for the Fireblade around this circuit, which hasn’t been easy. I think in race two I could have challenged for sixth position but I got a little hungry and lost the front, which resulted in me crashing out unfortunately. It’s not normally something that happens to me, but sometimes it does and you have to learn from it. The guys have collected a lot of data from this round and will be working towards finding solutions for Michael and myself to get the results we all want.
Pieter Breddels
Aragon has been a bit of a challenge for us as we have tried to find the optimum setting for the CBR1000RR and we knew that both races would be difficult. In race one Sylvain got off to a good start immediately going into the top-ten and finished the race ninth. Michael recovered his start well and was building good momentum and producing lap times that could match the guys in front of him. Unfortunately after ten-laps he had a small technical issue with the bike, which forced him out of the race. In race two Sylvain had a crash after loosing the front, which ended his weekend. For Michael it was a lot better, he fought all throughout the race to get into sixth position but on the very last lap had to settle for eighth. Both riders rode well all weekend but there is a gap at the front, which we now have to go back and an alyse and think how we can close this, and get closer to the action. Race 1 Results
1 Jonathan Rea 33m.36.937s GBR KAWASAKI Kawasaki Racing Team2 Chaz Davies +0.051s GBR DUCATI Aruba.it Racing-Ducati Superbike Team3 Tom Sykes +4.977s GBR KAWASAKI Kawasaki Racing Team4 Leon Haslam +15.088s GBR APRILIA Aprilia Racing Team - Red Devils5 Jordi Torres +15.290s ESP APRILIA Aprilia Racing Team - Red Devils6 Xavi Fores +16.655s ESP DUCATI Aruba.it Racing-Ducati Superbike Team7 Nicolas Terol +17.365s ESP DUCATI Althea Racing8 Leandro Mercado +25.527s ARG DUCATI BARNI Racing Team9 Sylvain Guintoli +31.464s FRA HONDA Pata Honda World Superbike Team10 Leon Camier +43.013s GBR MV MV Agusta Reparto CorseRace 2 Results
1 Chaz Davies 33m34.699s GBR DUCATI Aruba.it Racing-Ducati Superbike Team2 Jonathan Rea +3.190s GBR KAWASAKI Kawasaki Racing Team3 Leon Haslam +3.712s GBR APRILIA Aprilia Racing Team - Red Devils4 Jordi Torres +14.216s ESP APRILIA Aprilia Racing Team - Red Devils5 Xavi Fores +20.524s ESP DUCATI Aruba.it Racing-Ducati Superbike Team6 David Salom +25.878s ESP KAWASAKI Team Pedercini7 Leandro Mercado +25.939s ARG DUCATI BARNI Racing Team8 Michael van der Mark +26.075s NED HONDA Pata Honda World Superbike Team9 Ayrton Badovini +27.253s ITA BMW JR Racing Team10 Nicolas Terol +28.666s ESP DUCATI Althea RacingChampionship Standings
1 Jonathan Rea 140 pts GBR KAWASAKI Kawasaki Racing Team2 Leon Haslam 114 pts GBR APRILIA Aprilia Racing Team - Red Devils3 Chaz Davies 83 pts GBR DUCATI Aruba.it Racing-Ducati Superbike Team4 Tom Sykes 66 pts GBR KAWASAKI Kawasaki Racing Team5 Jordi Torres 63 pts ESP APRILIA Aprilia Racing Team - Red Devils6 Sylvain Guintoli 48 pts FRA HONDA Pata Honda World Superbike Team7 Nicolas Terol 41 pts ESP DUCATI Althea Racing8 Matteo Baiocco 39 pts ITA DUCATI Althea Racing9 Leandro Mercado 38 pts ARG DUCATI BARNI Racing Team10 Alex Lowes 34 pts GBR SUZUKI Voltcom Crescent Suzuki11 Michael van der Mark 28 pts NED HONDA Pata Honda World Superbike Team
