WSBK – Quadrupled from Ducati Xerox to Kyalami! – Supersport race

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Quadrupled from Ducati Xerox to Kyalami !

WSBK - Quadrupled from Ducati Xerox to Kyalami! - Supersport race

For the big comeback of the SBK World Cup in South Africa this weekend, Spies signed the 6th pole of his career – in 6 races! -, but Haga and Fabrizio proved intractable … In Supersport, Laverty and Crutchlow share the honors. Story.

Supersport Race

Kenan Sofuoglu jumps from his second place on the grid to 1st place in the race, followed by Eugene Laverty, Andrew Pitt, Joan Lascorz, Fabien Foret … Cal Crutchlow is therefore relegated to 6th place – despite his pole! – ahead of Roccoli, Fujiwara, Aitchison and McCoy.

After a relatively calm first lap – in terms of overtaking – Sofuoglu and Laverty are half a second ahead of Pitt 3rd, almost one over Lascorz and Foret, and two over the rest of the merry troop..

From the second round, Eugene Laverty takes the lead … never to leave him! "After the warm-up, I knew that we had the capacity to win and that, thanks to the efforts of the team", will humbly assure the Irish.

But Laverty may well claim that he benefited from the "perfect motorcycle"and thank his team, it is he and he alone who drives like an Ace the CBR n ° 50: in three laps, the guy sticks 1.5 seconds to Sofuoglu, 2007 world champion in the category !

The next two laps, as he took over from his Turkish teammate in 2nd place, Andrew Pitt – the reigning world champion Himself! – does not manage to widen the gap either: it rises to more than 3 seconds in the 5th lap !

That’s when Cal Crutchlow, championship leader intervenes. The Yamaha rider is on the rise: after overtaking Sofuoglu in complete collapse, Foret, Lascorz then Pitt, the n ° 35 sets off in pursuit of the Honda Parkalgar … without success. !

"It was really a difficult race, at the beginning it was a real battle", testified Crutchlow, handicapped by his bad start and a slow progress towards the outposts."By the time I arrive in 2nd position and he (Laverty, NDLR) already had a big lead", which the Yamaha rider will not be able to fill…

Fabien Foret is also fighting a good battle at the controls of his R6 n ° 99: if he does not manage to maintain the same pace as his teammate – nor that of Laverty of course – our Charentais manages from halfway through the race. to isolate himself on the 3rd step of the podium !

"The start of the race was a great fight and I did well", will objectively expose Fabien,"I had a good rhythm and I felt confident for the future. Unfortunately on the 19th lap, the beautiful mechanics got stuck…

"I had built a good lead in third place (more than 6 seconds on Sofuoglu and Lascorz, NDLR), when i lost my focus on a bend"… and lost the front end of his official Yamaha! The Frenchman could not set off again and, despite himself, revived the suspense for the very last laps !

Because now, Sofuoglu and Lascorz – even Aitchison housed just a second from the duo – can hope to climb on the podium. !

Two laps from the checkered flag drop, Kenan is still firmly in front of Joan, while Mark does everything possible to get back into contact with the ZX-6R and the CBR600RR … When the Turkish leaves a big comma on the tarmac and bounces in his saddle like a gozleme, the heart rate of the three riders – and the crowd – climbs again a notch !

But obviously, the finish that is woven between his three there leaves the director unmoved: the control screens now relay the solitary races of Laverty and Crutchlow, then the joy of their teams, girlfriends and other acquaintances..

On the track, however, the struggle rages on, as Lascorz will briefly describe: "the last lap was a very big fight, Sofuoglu passed me again, I doubled it so that in the end, Aitchison overtook us both" !

Unaware that Aitchison was driving so close to them, Lascorz apparently didn’t hesitate to force his line against Sofuoglu: "it was not a very nice maneuver on the part of Lascorz and it cost me the 3rd place", will notice the pilot n ° 54, before noting that"we were very slow today, and maybe we didn’t deserve a podium".

Kenan will not hide his astonishment, like his team-mate Andrew, that his CBR600RR, so efficient in testing, did not work in the race: "it was just not normal to be so slow, because we haven’t changed anything compared to yesterday when everything was OK", will observe the champion 2007.

Laverty him, is satisfied: "it was hard to control because Cal had the same pace as me and if he hadn’t been held back at the start it would have been a great battle". Still, the Irishman is delighted with his percentage of victory this season: 50% !

In the provisional therefore, Eugene Laverty (106 points) approaches his former opponent from British Supersport – in 2006 with Tom Sykes also – and current leader of the World Supersport Cal Crutchlow (119). Kenan Sofuoglu (83) continues to give ground while Pitt (64) and Lascorz (60) return to West (60).

Among the manufacturers, Honda is recovering after having stumbled in Monza, where no CBR was on the podium. The winged brand still leads (with 133 points) ahead of Yamaha 5119), Kawasaki (71), Triumph (36) and Suzuki (28).

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