Jonathan Rea was the man that ended Tom Sykes’ winning streak at Donington Park. The reigning WorldSBK champion snapped a nine-race streak for Sykes by winning Race 2 at the British round, and he’s excited ahead of his home round.
“Donington is a circuit of two halves,” said Rea. “Sector 1 and 2 are very flowing, and the final sector is very stop and start.”
“It’s very difficult to find the right setup, and you’re always making a compromise. Sometimes I have had a setting that is great for the first halfm and other times I’ve set the bike up for the final sector.”
“It really depends on what you need to do with the bike you have. You need to find a compromise between stability and agility, but it’s a very satisfying track to get right.
Round 6 of the 2018 WorldSBK Championship sees the paddock head for the home of Superbikes: Donington Park. The British circuit hosted the first ever round of the championship in 1988, and since then the affinity for superbike racing in the UK has only continued to grow.
The spectacular, flowing track has been the canvas for some of the most incredible moments in the history of the class, but will this weekend be remembered in the same light?
Above: Glen Irwin is a man fast on the roads and on the short circuits. He won the feature race at last year’s North West 200 and backed that up with a win in Macau. As I write this, he’s just won a race at the North West 200 on his Ducati.
If MotoGP contracts were handed out based solely on the character of a race track, then Oulton Park in England would be at the top of the list.
The city is set in the idyllic Cheshire countryside, only 30 miles from the Beatles hometown of Liverpool, and 13 miles from the historic city of Chester. The track is fast, techinical, with natural elevation changes and spectacular scenery.
There are few finer places to watch motorcycle racing when the sun is shining than at Oulton Park. The natural banking around the track offers great unobstructed views.
If you’re a keen photographer the circuit offers fantastic opportunities with very few fences getting in the way.
The United Kingdom has a new law, requiring companies with 250 or more employees to report to the authorities the earnings of its workers, by gender.
The topic has been a sticking point in the British news cycle right now, with woman across the company showing median earnings that are 12% lower than men, which is a sizable gap in income equality.
Where does the British motorcycle industry falls into place in all this? Well as Visordown initially reported, that is more difficult to say, as it appears that only Triumph Motorcycles meets the reporting criteria, amongst motorcycle manufacturers.
It seems every couple months we have to report on the changing landscape in the moto-journalism realm, as the motorcycle industry continues a heavy churn with its constant state of flux and never-ending evolution (or lack thereof).
So far, we have seen a massive shakeup of Bonnier’s motorcycle titles, including Cycle World going to a quarterly format and Motorcyclist publishing every-other month format, while closing titles like Sport Rider and consolidating titles like Bagger and Hot Bikes.
We have seen The MAG Group (which is going through its own bankruptcy proceedings right now) close the doors at Motorcycle-USA, and also sell Cycle News to the motorcycle industry’s top advertising network.
We have also seen RideApart sold to media conglomerate Motor1 (and recently lost its Editor-in-Chief), Vertical Scope’s Motorcycle.com just lost its #1 and #2 leaders, Canada Moto Guide (the largest online publication in that region) has switched ownership, and internet upstart Rider’s Domain (owned by Jake Wilson) just let go of a significant part of its content and editorial staff.
And now today, we report that UK publication MotoFire has announced that it is for sale, with founders Steve Hunt and Ian Jubb (two ex-MCN employees) looking to take a step back from the website.
If there is one thing that makes real life much more interesting than fiction, it is that real life is no respecter of plausible plot lines. If you were to take a script of the 2017 MotoGP season so far to a movie producer or a fiction publisher, they would reject it 30 seconds into your pitch. It is all a little too implausible.
Five riders battling for the championship after 12 rounds? Never happens. A championship leader with a record low number of points? A ridiculous notion. Riders winning races one weekend, then struggling to make the top five, or even top ten the next?
A horribly transparent plot device to create tension. Championship leaders conveniently crashing, struggling with tires, or suffering bike problems? A little too convenient to be credible.
How about the supposedly colorless second rider in a team suddenly blossoming into a championship contender? The most trite of clichés, like the mousy librarian who transforms into a babe once she takes her glasses off.
The struggle of a rider swapping bikes to become competitive, making up and down progress, and a big step forward when handed a technological MacGuffin? So blatant it’s obscene. No professional writer of fiction would stoop to such depths.
Is it going to be Argentina or Austin on Sunday at Silverstone? Two of the bumpiest circuits of the first half of the season had very different outcomes.
At the Termas De Rio Hondo circuit, Marc Márquez took off like a scalded cat to try to take the win, and claw back the valuable points from Maverick Viñales he had handed him at Qatar.
In undulating Austin, Márquez rode his usual imperious race to take victory, while it was Viñales’ turn to make a silly mistake.
The perils of a American bumps were rather bike-specific. It wasn’t just Marc Márquez who crashed out of the lead in Argentina, Repsol Honda teammate Dani Pedrosa managed the same feat.
Cal Crutchlow rode cautiously to finish third, while there were four Yamahas in the top six. At Austin, Márquez won, Pedrosa finished third, Crutchlow fourth. Valentino Rossi’s charge came too late, and he finished well behind Márquez. A year earlier, it had been Rossi making a silly mistake in Texas, and slipping off.
So how does Silverstone compare to the two American tracks (North and South)? In Austin, the bumps were on corner exit, Maverick Viñales explained, whereas at Silverstone, the bumps are on corner entry.
“So it seems more difficult to ride,” the Movistar Yamaha rider said. In Argentina, it wasn’t so much bumps as massive undulations which were causing the problems.
