WSBK – Supersport World Champion Carpenter! –

Posted on by admin

Supersport World Champion Carpenter !

WSBK - Supersport World Champion Carpenter! -

Sebastien Charpentier starts from pole for the eighth time this season. He is in optimal conditions to win the world title and why not, a ninth victory! On the Superbike side, Vermeulen takes the lead… Loans ?

The weather is bright in Assen, the Cathedral of the Motorcycle. Despite Toseland’s domination during the practice sessions, it was Chris Vermeulen who signed the superpole in 2’04”179. This is a great first for him and for the Dutch Team Ten Kate in the Superbike category. In the front row, Vermeulen is ahead of Toseland, Corser and Haga. On the second row, we find Muggeridge in front of Pitt, Kagayama and Martin on his Petronas! The third line is made up of three Italians – Chile, Lanzi and Clementi – and young Neukirchner.

Where is Laconi? Nowhere … His two bad falls in the same turn on Friday morning prevented him from continuing his weekend. His shoulder injury could even jeopardize his participation in the German event next week.

The Supersport grid thrills the large crowd since the two Honda Ten Kate de Charpentier and Fujiwara are in front! The Honda of Fabrizio and the Yam of Curtain follow. Foret is leading the second row ahead of Nannelli, Chambon and Corradi. The third row also includes a Frenchman, Mathieu Lagrive, who starts in 12th position.

First Superbike race

It is Haga who takes the best start while Vermeulen finds himself in the big package … But the young Australian is not discouraged for all that and overtakes each of his competitors, including Haga. And once installed in the lead, Chris Vermeulen will no longer be worried.

Toseland and Haga, on the other hand, fight an epic battle. If the ducatist dominates the entire course, he fails to counter all of Nitro Nori’s relentless attacks … Finally, the Briton will get the better of the Japanese devil, finishing more than three seconds behind Chris Vermeulen who wins his second win of the season.

For the first time this year, Corser does not finish on the podium! He is still fourth, just two seconds behind Haga: "I had grip problems with the rear wheel and I couldn’t open the throttle wide without the bike reacting more or less well"Deprived of acceleration, the Australian tried to compensate by requesting his front axle:"I pushed forward like I had never done before, a little more and I was falling !"For his part, Andrew Pitt confirms the good health of the Yamaha R1 by finishing in fifth place while Kagayama struggled to get ahead of the Ducati de Lanzi: what is happening for the loyal Lieutenant de Corser ?

The German Neukirchner is ranked 8th ahead of Muggeridge, Chili and Clementi. Sebastien Gimbert, despite a leg that "still cause some problems", scores 4 points for 12th place and the rest of the points go to the two Petronas of McCoy and Martin and to the Kawa of Bussei.

Supersport Race

Charpentier passed the first corner in the lead just ahead of his teammate Fujiwara, Fabrizio, Harms, Corradi, Curtain, Foret and Chambon. Very quickly, Fabrizio passed Fuji and got into Sebastien’s wheel. The Italian does not seem embarrassed for the moment by his foot injury !

Sebastien tries to make the hole from the first laps while behind, the peloton is organized. Foret passed Curtain in the chicane before the straight. Fabrizio slowly lets go of Charpentier, Harms also marks time and Foret continues to increase his pace…

In the 4th lap, Katsuaki Fujiwara moved to second position at the end of the straight line and began his recovery on Sebastien Charpentier who wanted to isolate himself in the lead. Fabrizio gets in the wheel of the Japanese, not wanting the race to come down to another brawl between the Ten Kate machines! Foret tries different trajectories than Harms and ends up finding the fault. Harms reacts and recovers his fourth place … for just a few turns !

In the 5th lap, Katsuaki, who set the fastest time in the race, found himself under Sebastien’s pot. The instruction of Ronald Ten Kate – who finally asked his pilots to start hostilities only in the last six laps, after declaring that he would not give any instructions – will it be applied? For his part, Fabien gets rid of Harms for good.

Charpentier reacted to his teammate’s approach and offered himself a few steps ahead. But during the 7th passage in front of the pits, Fujiwara overtakes the French! Carried away by his enthusiasm, the Japanese insisted too much on his rear brake on first braking and found himself on the outside of the bend. Sebastien and the two Honda Team Megabike take the opportunity to overtake him: everything has to be redone for Fuji !

Halfway through the race, five riders are still fighting for victory: Seb and Katsu on their Honda Ten Kate, Fabien and Fabrizio on Honda Megabike as well as Curtain, again the only Yamaha. Harms is more than a second and a half behind the leaders. Parkes is isolated in 7th position while 8th place is coveted by no less than six drivers including Stephane Chambon and Mathieu Lagrive…

Charpentier raises the tone. Suddenly, Foret overtook his Italian teammate and decided not to let go of his compatriot. On the 9th lap, in the first straight, Fabien tries a maneuver very inside the bend: his slider touches the ground in a plume of dust … Charpentier remains in the lead but very quickly, Fabien sets out again to assault. He allows himself to make the outside world champion – still virtual -, the two Honda coming out of the long right fairing against fairing. The next turn is a left … Fabien, who is better placed, brakes late and hard and seems to have gained the advantage. But Sebastien, who admittedly braked earlier, enters the bend with more speed and therefore comes out in front … Very, very beautiful spectacle !

Fuji meanwhile does not give up hope and has already passed Fabrizio. The Japanese is excited: if he wants to keep a small chance for the title, he must imperatively finish in front of his teammate !

At the start of the 10th lap, Seb and Fabien passed each other several times. Suddenly, Fujiwara and Fabrizio took the opportunity to recover the few tens of meters granted to the two Charentais. Curtain stays within a second of the furious heads.

In the next two laps, the pilots enter an observation phase: the time has come to prepare for the end of the race … Foret has learned the lesson: he overtakes Sebastien in the same right as in the 9th lap, but this this time inside. He keeps the lead in the sequence that follows but does not resist Charpentier’s attack in the chicane…

Sebastien wants to win the race, but above all he has to stay on his wheels and get ahead of Fujiwara to win the title! On the penultimate lap, he was just half a second ahead. Fuji mixes his brushes with his box and lets Fabrizio and Curtain pass! But the real battle is right in front…

In the long left which precedes the last chicane, Foret takes advantage of a slight gap from Charpentier to overtake him! Fabien therefore starts the last lap in the lead and will keep his position until the finish! Sebastien has waited far too long for his title to let it go because of a crash. He manages to stay in contact with Foret but cannot pass it safely.

Foret therefore won his ninth victory in Supersport! Charpentier crosses the line with his arms raised: he is 2005 world champion three races before the end of the season, unprecedented in this category! Fabrizio came third just one second behind Foret. Curtain is fourth and Fujiwara manages to keep his fifth place. Then it was Harms and Parkes’ turn to cross the finish line, before a horde of savages fighting for the 8th position, finally obtained by Chambon ahead of Lauslehto, Fores, Lagrive, Stigefeltet and Vos – all in the same half a second! Jansen and Kallio score the last points.

In the Championship, General Seb has 210 points (out of 225 possible) and becomes world champion, Fujiwara and his 127 points can no longer catch him … The Japanese must now focus on his pursuers who follow him closer and closer: Curtain (122 pts), Foret (110 pts) and Fabrizio (98 pts) are all in great shape and want to finish the season with style! For his part, Chambon is sixth with 76 points.

The second Superbike race

The second race sees the same contenders fighting for victory. But this time, Vermeulen misses the first turn and takes more time to move up the peloton … A superb fight followed with Nori Haga (again him!) Until the checkered flag! "Nori had a fantastic race this afternoon and it’s always fun to fight against him: still very close but without contact", confided the Australian. His compatriot Corser once again classified fourth, Chris grabbed some points thanks to this double:"Troy is still a long way off so I need two more wins next week". Strongly Lausitzring !

Nitro Nori for his part regrets that the races did not last longer: "one more round and I could have tried something better !"His two podiums remain satisfactory, especially since the weather conditions were difficult:"it was hot and sweat was affecting my vision after only three laps! In the last laps I thought about giving up", explained the Japanese !

Toseland goes from second to third step, but finds that "it was one of the best races I have done to finish third. Well done to Chris and Nori, they didn’t make a single misstep !"As for Regis Laconi, the good results of the official Ducati only increase his disappointment … Andrew Pitt again finished fifth ahead of Lanzi, Neukirchner, Muggeridge, Abe, Bostrom, Kagayama, McCoy, Gimbert, Chili and Bussei.

In the championship, Corser obviously remains in the lead with 370 points, but loses 24 points against his dolphin Vermeulen (284). Laconi’s counter remained stuck at 214 points and the French helplessly witnessed the skyrocketing of Haga (203) and Toseland (197). Kagayama remains sixth with 187 points ahead of Walker, Chile, Pitt and Muggeridge. Abe and Gimbert, from Team Yamaha Motor France are respectively 11th and 16th.

There is no question for the participants of the World Superbike and Supersport to rest because from next week the 10th event will take place on the Eurospeedway of Lausitzring! If Sebastien Charpentier can approach this next race calmly – because he is out of reach – Corser will have to produce two good performances because Vermeulen is climbing slowly … but surely. !

Related articles

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *