Just a few days after the end of the Magny-Cours round of the championship World SBK Superbike, and with two-thirds of the season now complete, the on-track action from KRT and Kawasaki riders alex lowes and Axel Bassani continued at a steady pace with two days of testing at the Motorland Aragon circuit in Spain on September 11 and 12.
In addition to preparing for the upcoming Motorland round of the championship at the end of September (after a new WorldSBK round in Cremona a week before), this test in Aragon continues the development journey of the official Ninja ZX-10RR in order to achieve the best possible results in the last four rounds of the exciting 2024 season.
Although there will be a factory Bimota by KRT team for Axel and Alex in 2025, and a different machine to ride, the Ninja ZX-10R will still be featured in a factory team run by the current Kawasaki Puccetti Racing team. This makes the Motorland test a step into the future for the ZX-10RR in WorldSBK, as well as an important period of preparation for the Motorland race weekend itself. With the 5,077km circuit having been recently resurfaced, this test allowed KRT to familiarise themselves with the new asphalt before racing in earnest at Motorland on 27-29 September. KRT encountered dry but windy conditions throughout the test. Despite this challenge, both sides of the KRT garage made the best possible use of the available track time and will approach the next round in Italy with increased confidence.
WorldSBK round nine will take place in Cremona from 20-22 September. It will be the first of four rounds that will take place over a five-week period before the season concludes on 20 October.
alex lowes : “Another positive test overall. We found some difficult conditions with the wind, but I felt good with the bike. We managed to try different tyre combinations. I think tyre life could be an issue during the race weekend, depending on the temperature and track conditions. The new surface is very different to the old one. We gathered good information from two full race simulations, and we did a lot of laps. Now I am ready to go home, spend a birthday weekend with my family and recharge the batteries for the two race weekends that are about to come. Thanks to the team for their efforts over the past week.”
Axel Bassani : “We spent two days on the Aragon circuit and we improved some parts of the bike. I think these two days of testing were productive. The new asphalt has a lot of grip. We used the SCO tyre and once the SCX. On the last afternoon the wind intensified, but in general we worked a lot on the electronics and we also tried something new on the front. It worked well and I hope it will be the same in Cremona. These two days were long, because it is never easy to do tests right after a race weekend. But the team was good and we did a lot of laps. I am really happy with the work of the team and the improvements we found.”
Riba pears, Alex Lowes' team leader: “We had two days of testing which were positive. We mainly focused on preparing for the race weekend at Motorland. I think it was good to test because the track has had a new surface for a few months. It’s completely different to what it was before. It’s very smooth and doesn’t have any bumps, but it’s very, very grippy. It’s very demanding in terms of grip and we’ve gathered a lot of information about that. At the same time, we’ve tried a few things. Alex has been one of the fastest drivers, quite consistently. We’re now looking forward to going to Cremona and working with the team again.”
Marcel Duinker, team leader of Axel Bassani: “Overall it was a good test. On the first day we struggled a bit with the new track surface, which was very grippy and upset the balance of the bike. It took us a while to get used to it and make some small changes to the bike’s setup. On Thursday morning we started well and Axel was in good shape. He was very fast straight away with the race tyres. We did all our testing in the morning because we knew the wind would pick up in the afternoon. It was more important to test some important materials, so in the afternoon we did a race simulation. The only thing I can say is that Axel is improving every time he gets on the bike. He showed very, very good speed in this test. Axel is constantly adapting and improving, and we improved our bike in this test. I’m looking forward to Cremona.”
Superbike Kawasaki test Aragon
