Fog on Thursday, rain on Friday and fog on Saturday, the third meeting of the Japanese Superbike championship almost went to the ace, at Sugo, the Yamaha test circuit in Miyagi prefecture.
However, following a fairly complicated qualification system, Kazuma Tsuda obtained his first pole position for the first race on his Suzuki from the BabyFace Powered by Yoshimura team, while Katsuyuki Nakasuga took the same position for race 2.
Unfortunately for the Suzuki rider, Race 1 on Saturday was canceled due to heavy fog, and, in return, half points were added to the standings for the relevant qualification.
“Race classification canceled” : Kazuma Tsuda (Suzuki), Katsuyuki Nakasuga (Yamaha), Somichi Hamahara (Honda), Yuudai Kamei (Honda), Ryuichi Kiyonari (Honda), Kousuke Akiyoshi (Kawasaki), etc.
The mist was still present on Sunday morning, but everything settled during the warm-up and the program was able to proceed smoothly.
In race 2, after a good start from Katsuyuki Nakasuga, started from pole position, and Kousuke Akiyoshi, 4th on the grid, Kazuma Tsuda fall at the 3rd corner and leads to the appearance of the safety car. Nakasuga, Kiyonari, Akiyoshi, Kamei, Hamahara, Yukio Kagayama (Suzuki) and Teppei Nagoshi will follow it in this order for two turns before being able to fight again.
At the time of recovery, Kiyonari takes the best of It lit up in the first turn but gets passed back into the straight on the next pass.
From there, the Yamaha rider will widen the gap during a race mainly experienced alone, leaving the rest of the field to compete for the places of honor.
Three pilots, Hamahara, Kamei et Kiyonari, were in contention for the last two places on the podium, but the fall of Kamei in the last round simplified the debates… Kamei was nevertheless able to restart to finish 12th, while 4th place went to Kagayama, 5th place at Nagoshi and 6th place at Akira Yanagawa.
Race 2 ranking:
1- Katsuyuki Nakasuga, YZF-R1, YAMAHA FACTORY RACING TEAM, 37'48.670
2 – Somichi Hamahara, CBR1000RR-R, Honda Dream RT 桜井ﾎﾝﾀﾞ, +9,874
3- Ryuichi Kiyonari, CBR1000RR-R, Astemo Honda Dream SI Racing, +10,013
4 – Yukio Kagayama, GSX-R1000, Team KAGAYAMA, +19,132
5 – Teppei Nagoshi CBR1000RR-R, MuSASHi RT HARC-PRO.HONDA, +38,346
6 – Akira Yanagawa, ZX-10R, will-raisacingRS-ITOH, +44,939
Etc
The championship ranking is not yet published, but with the maximum of 135 points after 5 and a half races, Katsuyuki Nakasuga borders on absolute perfection, having only conceded 2,5 points from his 2nd place during qualifying for the canceled race 1!
So, obviously, this championship offers the particularity of not being contested by “partridges of the year”, as evidenced for example below by some of the 13 participants who are Yukio Kagayama, Ryuichi Kiyonari, Katsuyuki Nakasuga ou Akira Yanagawa, but it allows Japanese manufacturers to compete fiercely to best prepare the motorcycles which will then roll on our roads. A question of technology, but also of honor...
The next round of the JSB1000 will take place at Suzuka from July 17-18.
The Superbike race can be seen below, starting at 3:30 a.m.
Photo credits: Powered_by_JP4A
