HONDA RACING INFORMATION FIM SUPERBIKE / SUPERSPORT WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP ROUND 06 SUNDAY JUNE 09 PORTIMAO, PORTUGAL PREVIEW TWO MORE CHANCES FOR REA TO SHINE UNDER THE PORTUGUESE SUN Jonathan Rea (Pata Honda World Superbike Team) had his first Superbike ride for his Dutch based team at the Portimao round of the 2008 FIM Superbike World Championship and he returns there for the sixth round of the championship keen to get his first 2013 season race win on the board. Jonathan has already scored a second place at Assen on his 2013 specification CBR1000RR but at Portimao in the recent past he has secured no fewer than six podiums. He is yet to win a race at the 4.592km venue, located in the hills behind the most popular holiday resorts on the Algarve coast, and would love to score his first victory of 2013 there to start his march back up the championship points table from his current seventh place. Leon Haslam (Pata Honda World Superbike Team) had recovered sufficiently from his broken left leg to try and race at his home round of Donington in late May but he was not quite ready to face two full Superbike contests. Haslam has now regained a lot more mobility and bend in his left knee after his tibia and fibula break at Assen in late April and he feels he should be able to race for good points scoring positions at this forthcoming round. Leon is also rider who knows how to get to the podium at Portimao, as he first did on a CBR1000RR way back in a privateer season in 2008. The Portimao track is a superbly designed venue albeit contained in a limited amount of space. Since it first opened it has provided a tough challenge for all riders, simply because of its many dramatic dips and elevations, with multiple blind corner entries and short straights that ensure the riders of a modern-day SBK machines get virtually no breathing space between corners. Even the main straight, approached at a fast pace, has a rise that becomes almost a jump at the beginning and then onto a downhill approach to the first corner. After the Portimao weekend is completed the SBK circus heads to Italy for the second time in 2013, for a visit to another hilly and physical racetrack, Imola. The classic Italian venue hosts the seventh round on June 30. ROLLERCOASTER RIDE COMING UP FOR HONDA’S WSS RIDERS Lorenzo Zanetti (Pata Honda World Supersport Team) and his team-mate Michael van der Mark (Pata Honda World Supersport Team) are currently fourth and fifth respectively in the FIM Supersport World Championship standings with the Portuguese event about to take place on Sunday 9 June. As each Pata Honda rider is a rookie in this class taking their CBR600RR machines to the limit around the unique ‘rollercoaster’ of the 4.592km track in the hills above the Algarve will be a thrilling new experience. They have each raced at Portimao before, Van der Mark on a Superstock 600 Honda, on which he won both of the most recent races in Portugal. Zanetti has also ridden at Portimao in recent seasons, on large capacity Superstock and Superbike machines. Jack Kennedy (Rivamoto Honda) is another class rookie who has shown pace and ability in 2013, having scored his personal best of sixth last time out at Donington. He has tested at Portimao, although in changeable and wet conditions last winter, so at least he will know which way the incredibly undulating and sinuous track goes when he goes out for the first practice session on Friday. Portimao is no mystery to Sheridan Morais (PTR Honda) as he took a podium place there in Superstock 1000 racing in 2011. After struggling with recent injury he is looking to Portimao as a place to improve on his previous best result in 2013, sixth. Luca Marconi (PTR Honda) is two places behind Morais in the championship table, 16th, and now looking for more top ten finishes to realize his ambitions in this class of racing. It is a similar story for former 125cc GP Champion Gabor Talmacsi (PRORACE Honda) as he continues to unlock the secrets of WSS competition. He has raced at Portimao before and understands how much preparation needs to go into this intense circuit, which features so many blind corner entries and elevation changes. Currently Gabor is 23rd overall, thanks to his first points score with 12th place at the previous round. Championship points in the last two races, including a 13th place at Donington last time out, have shown Raffaele De Rosa (Team Lorini Honda) the way forward as he now sits in 24th place in the points standings. David Linortner (Team Honda PTR) is another rider in the points scoring tally for Honda, but Imre Toth (Racing Team Toth Honda), Eduard Blokhin (Rivamoto Honda), Nacho Calero Perez (Honda PTR) and Matt Davies (Team Honda PTR) have all yet to score, such is the strength in depth of WSS competition in 2013. HONDA RIDER COMMENTS: Jonathan Rea (Pata Honda World Superbike Team) "It took me a while to get over the disappointment of Donington but I’ve thrown myself into the TT on the Isle of Man. I’ve been playing on trials bikes and watching the races and Honda invited me to the Joey Dunlop memorial dinner on Saturday. I usually look forward to the weather in Portugal, but it’s been awesome on the Isle of Man this week, where 17 degrees feels like 25. I really love the Portimao circuit. It’s one of the highlights of the season for me and the undulations throw everything at the rider in a proper test. When the bike’s been good this year, it’s been really good, but unfortunately the electronics have been a bit of a thorn in our side and that was the case at Donington. I’m looking forward to this weekend though, and hoping that the guys will be on top of everything to allow us to realise some of the bike’s potential." Leon Haslam (Pata Honda World Superbike Team) "I biggest thing is that the movement and bend of my left knee has got a lot better since Donington so we are working on the strength of my leg now. Three or four weeks of not using the muscles means that they go pretty quickly so I have been working hard with my physio trying to get the strength back. The lack of bend in my leg and the strength of my muscles were the two things that held me back from riding in the races at Donington, but both of those things have been improved. Portimao is a track that is very demanding so it is going to be a big test. The three tracks I have tried to come back for – Donington, Portimao and Imola – are the three hardest on the calendar in a physical sense so If I can come back at any of them then I know I will be fine for any of the up and coming races. My knee hurt the whole weekend at Donington and all the doctors have advised me to rest it. I had probably been overworking it, trying to get fit for my home race last time out. So now I am not overdoing it and hopefully I can rest it in the run up to Portugal. I can then go session-by-session rather than try and do too much too soon.” Lorenzo Zanetti (Pata Honda World Supersport Team) "I am ready for the Portimao race and I have to be confident and happy after the last two races at Monza and Donington because we have taken a good direction in the set-up of the bike. So I will take a positive feeling to Portimao even though it is not my favourite track. I will push 100% and try to get a good result because after Portimao we arrive at another favourite track of mine, Imola. Now I am in fourth place in the championship so it will be necessary to aim for top fives places in all the races. It is important to work with the team to continue to improve the bike’s performance as well because the other bikes are also fast, but we have a good potential with the Honda and I have a good team around me. Because of this I am not feeling a lot of pressure. The last two races have been held on very different tracks, Monza and Donington, but it went well at both of them. I think the base set-up will be strong for all the other tracks from now on." Michael van der Mark (Pata Honda World Supersport Team) "My foot injury is getting better, but slowly, so maybe I am doing too much with it. That said it is not too bad. Portimao is a track I really like and in the last two years in Superstock 600 I had good results. After the disappointment of Monza and Donington we need another good result and I think we can do it now. We just want a normal weekend and I hope that the team and I can work together to earn many points. The package and the base of the bike is really good, we just need to find that last little part every time, which has been proving difficult sometimes. If you look at all the qualifying sessions we have a good race pace but we need to find that little extra in qualifying. If we lose Friday practice time to weather conditions we lose a lot of track time we really need, especially in my first WSS season.” Jack Kennedy (Rivamoto Honda) "I am busy with my preparations and training for the next track at Portimao. I do know this track because we had a test here at the beginning of the year but it was mainly wet for two days. It is a strange track really, big time, because the hills on it are crazy! A super track though. It is very physical round there so I am expecting a tough race but I have been training extra hard to overcome the arm pump I suffered at Donington. It would be nice to have a dry Friday and not a wet Friday for once. There have been a lot of wet first days so far and that leaves us on the back foot a bit compared to teams who have data from all the tracks last year." Luca Marconi (PTR Honda) "I took a standard Honda CBR600RR to Adria, a short track near my home, to do some track training in readiness for the Portuguese race weekend. I made 120 laps on Monday and I feel ready to race now. Portimao is like a motocross track with asphalt; it is so up and down. I just want to achieve a good result again after the no-score at Donington. The team and I will do our best to achieve this." Gabor Talmacsi (PRORACE Honda) "I am planning a little bit of relaxation before the race at Portimao because the place is very nice but I will need all the kilometres I can get at that track when I arrive there because I only rode it for the first time last year. It is very hard because it is so up and down. My goal this time is to get into the top ten. I am ready for this so why not? The most important thing about this track is to know where you are because then it is easy to prepare for the corners. If you do not have the reference points worked out you will be lost. It will be important to cycle around it, run around it, walk around it a lot, to check all these points for each corner. It is a very exciting track and the only negative thing is that the bike is always doing a wheelie so you have to think about this to stop it doing it too much and losing you time.”
Posted on: Wed, 05 Jun 2013 08:54:21 +0000