The Kawasaki WorldSSP Team finished their home race weekend at the Misano World Circuit ‘Marco Simoncelli’ on a positive note after Jeremy Alcoba fought his way through to fifth in the final race classification. Dominique Aegerter finished 13th and scored more championship points.
The Italian-based Kawasaki WorldSSP Team and its many guests at Misano enjoyed the sunshine all weekend and then some real excitement in the final race for the WorldSSP competitors.
Jeremy Alcoba went from 19th on the grid to an eventual fifth place, ending his race just 8.513 seconds from the race winner despite his lowly starting position.
The 18-lap second race in WorldSSP was held in very hot conditions, with 34°C ambient temperatures and 52°C track temperatures to contend with for Jeremy, Dominique and their Ninja ZX-6R 636 machines.
The challenge was handled well, as even in finishing 13th (as he had in Saturday’s Race One) Aegerter finished just 11.369 seconds from race winner Albert Arenas. He was five seconds closer to the winner’s race time on Sunday than he was on Saturday.
Dominique could possibly have made even more advances but two contacts with other competitors lost him some ground near the end of what was the final race on the regular Misano WorldSBK race card.
In the championship, after seven of 12 rounds, Alcoba is ninth, with 100 points, while Aegerter is 17th, with 31 points.
There will be something of a mini-break in the championship before the eighth round of the WorldSSP Championship takes place between 10-12 July, at the Donington Park circuit in the UK.
Manuel Puccetti
“Alcoba scored a great result in Race 2, reaching the top five after recovering well. Aegerter also did well, finishing close to the top ten, where we want to place on a regular basis. We finish the weekend in a positive fashion and in roughly two weeks’ time we’ll carry out a two-day test (Cremona, 26-27 June), to improve the performance of our bike so that we can push for the goals we’ve set ourselves this season”.
Jeremy Alcoba
“We finished Sunday with a really good result. I did not expect to finish fifth after how the rest of the weekend went, but I have to say thanks to Kawasaki and all the team – everybody is here – as I felt the support. It was very hot today, but I didn’t feel it because I was pushing and feeling quite good. I managed the hot temperature really well, and the others were struggling. I tried to ride really smoothly, and every lap I saw that I was catching the big group of riders. I found the right way to pass them. With two laps to go, I looked back and saw that we were finally a group of three riders. I said ‘OK, overtake one of the riders in front this lap and then one on the last lap’, which I did in the same corner. I felt really well in the T14, and I made the same pass each time. I am very happy and I gave my all; more than 100%. Thanks to everybody and on to the next one!”
Dominique Aegerter
“The home race for the team is now complete and we are making some forward steps. We are getting closer to the front guys. I am getting a better feeling also, and I can adapt better to the bike now. I was 13th in that race and that’s for sure not what we expect, or the result that we want to have. But, we were fighting close to the top five, and Jeremy finished top five, so congrats to him. I had a little bit of bad luck in the last two laps, with two big hits from another rider. So I lost a few positions.”
