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Thailand World Superbike Debrief: Hard Racing at Chang

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Good clean racing or overstepping the mark? That was the question being asked on the Sunday night in Thailand, after a thrilling race long duel between Tom Sykes and Jonathan Rea.

For many the sight of Sykes fighting tooth and nail and refusing to cede the win to his teammate was something that was hoped for, but not expected this year.

The Kawasaki teammates fought a war of words over the winter, but after Rea’s dominant title victory last year, many expected something similar this year.

While Rea has walked away with 95 points from the first four races, the message from Sykes in Thailand was clear: You’re not going to have it all your own way this time around!

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Podcast

Paddock Pass Podcast – Episode 19 – WSBK at Phillip Island

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The first race of the 2016 World Superbike season is in the bag, and the second round of racing is coming to us from Thailand later this week. This gives the Paddock Pass Podcast crew plenty to talk about from the World Superbike paddock.

Episode 19 has the extra treat of an interview with Ronald Ten Kate, the man behind Ten Kate Racing, which is running Honda’s factory WSBK effort.

He and David talk about the team’s progress in the off-season, how things are shaping up in the garage with Nicky Hayden and Michael van der Mark, and what is ahead on the road.

If you are a World Superbike fan, you won’t want to miss this excellent show from the Paddock Pass Podcast boys. David event gets the intro right…almost.

As always, be sure to follow the Paddock Pass Podcast on Facebook, Twitter and subscribe to the show on iTunes and SoundCloud – we even have an RSS feed for you. If you like the show, we would really appreciate you giving it a review on iTunes. Thanks for listening!

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WSBK

WSBK: Promising Beginnings for Pata Yamaha

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Setting the fastest time on the opening day of the season put smiles on the faces of everyone in the Pata Yamaha garage, but the rest of the weekend wasn’t quite as smooth.

While Sylvain Guintoli converted his opening day speed into strong race finishes, the challenge facing the team is clear: getting the most from the YZF-R1.

As with any racing Yamaha, the key to generating speed and performance from the R1 is corner speed. Watch the bike on track and it’s very similar to what you can expect when you look at Jorge Lorenzo in MotoGP.

Yamaha riders need to carry corner speed and momentum at all times and be as smooth as possible.

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WSBK

Phillip Island WSBK Test Tuesday Summary: Rea Answers

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Jonathan Rea leads the field after an incident-packed second day of testing for the World Superbike class at Phillip Island. Warmer weather and intense testing saw several riders take some serious tumbles, with a couple of riders suffering significant injury.

Fabio Menghi fell and fractured a hip in the morning, while Josh Hook crashed in the afternoon and dislocated his shoulder, and fracturing his greater tubercle (top of the bone in the upper arm). The crashes and subsequent clean-up meant that much of the afternoon session was lost, as marshals tried to clear the track.

The second day of testing did throw up the intriguing prospect of a nicely mixed field. Rea topped the morning session on the Kawasaki, while Sylvain Guintoli was quickest in the afternoon, on the Pata Yamaha. The top four overall times were set on four different bikes, less than a quarter of a second separating them.

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WSBK

Phillip Island WSBK Test Monday Summary: Sykes Leads

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With the World Superbike season almost upon us, the WSBK grid is at Phillip Island for two days of testing, ahead of the first event of the year which starts this weekend.

Rain disrupted practice for WSBK, just as it had for MotoGP last week, though the consequences were less severe. The rain and track conditions saw a few people fall – some, such as Karel Abraham, quite hard – but everyone will be fit to start testing again tomorrow.

With the start of the season so close, most of the work being done was on set up for the weekend, and it was once again the Kawasakis who came out on top, especially during the afternoon session.

Tom Sykes ended up on top of the timesheets, much to the delight of the Kawasaki man, who has historically not fared well at the circuit.

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WSBK

Pata Yamaha Previews the 2016 World Superbike Season

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The 2016 World Superbike season is rapidly approaching, and Yamaha Racing wants to remind you all that it has entered back into the premier production racing championship.

As such, the Pata Yamaha squad stayed over an extra day at the Jerez Test earlier this month, producing a little preview video of the WSBK season to come.

Asphalt & Rubber was lucky enough to be on-location with the Pata Yamaha team during the filming of this video, which is only an interesting piece of information in that we finally get to see the finished product from the work we witnessed first-hand.

Time will tell if the Yamaha YZF-R1 can be competitive in WSBK, right out of the gate. It certainly looks the business in person, with riders Sylvain Guintoli and Alex Lowes working well with the Crescent Racing squad.

Let the countdown begin for the WSBK season-opener at Phillip Island, on February 28th. It should be a good season.

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Podcast

Paddock Pass Podcast – Episode 17 – Jerez WSBK Test

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The latest episode of the Paddock Pass Podcast comes from the World Superbike paddock, as myself and Steve English attended the WSBK test in Jerez, Spain a couple week ago.

Getting a chance to talk to most of the top teams, Steve and I go through what we can expect to see this season, and how things are shaping up for the boys in the World Superbike.

We hope to be bringing you a number of episodes that will cover the World Superbike Championship throughout the year, so there is something to look forward to in that regard.

The WSBK season starts officially in the last week of February, and we plan on being there starting Race 1.

As always, be sure to follow the Paddock Pass Podcast on Facebook, Twitter and subscribe to the show on iTunes and SoundCloud – we even have an RSS feed for you. If you like the show, we would really appreciate you giving it a review on iTunes. Thanks for listening!

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Bikes

The 2016 Yamaha YZF-R1 Is Ready for WSBK Duty

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Yamaha is headed back to the World Superbike paddock, and it is not taking any half-measures in doing so. As such, the Japanese manufacturer has retained the talents of Sylvain Guintoli (World Superbike Champion, 2014) and Alex Lowes (British Superbike Champion, 2013), with the highly regarded Crescent Racing running the factory-backed team.

Officially debuting the team today in Spain, along with Yamaha’s other racing programs, the Pata Yamaha Official WorldSBK Team should be a potent package for the pinnacle of production motorcycle racing, and we expect strong results from them, right off the bat.

This is because the new Yamaha YZF-R1 had an entire year of honing at the national level, where in the USA it won both the Superbike and Superstock 1000 classes in the MotoAmerica racing series, and in the UK Josh Brookes took the BSB Championship victory as well.

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Racing

Official: Yamaha Returns to World Superbike for 2016

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An announcement that has been expected for quite a while now, Yamaha is officially returning to the World Superbike Championship for the 2016 season.

The news comes after nearly a season of competition for the Yamaha YZF-R1 in other classes, which has seemingly given Yamaha Motor Europe the confidence to support a factory team in the premier production racing series.

Helping Yamaha in that endeavor will be the experience WSBK outfit of Crescent Racing, who will run the day-to-day operations of the team, while Yamaha Racing develops the racing platform and strategy.

Yamaha’s return is already well-formed, as both Sylvain Guintoli and Alex Lowes will be riding for the factory team. Additionally, Yamaha Racing has already secured PATA as the team’s title sponsor.

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Racing

Sunday at Laguna Seca with Scott Jones

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WSBK Laguna Seca weather

The weather is often a large part of the story at Laguna Seca. Usually it’s either heat, like the dangerously hot 2006 MotoGP weekend, or morning fog that delays the start of a day’s sessions, like nearly every time an event is held at this circuit.

But today the weather was a sudden thunderstorm that started just before sunrise. As the paddock came awake, lightning was flashing to the south and rain was drenching the circuit, washing the rubber off the asphalt and soaking the Media Center, to name only a couple of moisture-related casualties.

Out came the rain tires for the morning warm-up, and away they went on a track that was drying but still wet. But by the time Race 1 arrived, it was back to slicks for two dry races.

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Racing

Saturday at Laguna Seca with Scott Jones

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Ducati Panigale R WSBK 2015 Laguna Seca

It’s great to be back on Asphalt & Rubber again, sitting next to Jensen in a media center at a race track, preparing photos for the A&R readers.

It’s great to be back at a World Superbike race as well, where the atmosphere is more relaxed than MotoGP. The bikes are just as shiny, and apparently you can just mosey down to your local dealer and buy one!

The bike above rolled right off the show room floor, I’m told. It would look great in my garage.

Leon and Ron Haslam Aprilia WSBK 2015 Laguna Seca

There’s also a jovial family atmosphere. Here two generations of Haslam watch Superpole 1, which is more amusing to some than to others.

Chaz Davies Ducati WSBK 2015 Laguna Seca

Chaz Davies took the honors in Superpole 2 on a day that featured two Ducatis at the top of the time sheet.

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