After Most at the end of July and before Magny-Cours on September 10, the long WorldSBK summer break is interrupted by two days of testing at Motorland Aragon on Tuesday 29 and Wednesday 30 August for four official teams and some riders from the FIM Superbike World Championship. But Kawasaki will only respond half present...
Indeed, as they only have one day left out of the ten days of authorized testing, Jonathan Rhea et alex lowes will only run on the last day of testing, Wednesday August 30.
Waiting, Florian Marino, the usual coach ofalex lowes and team development rider since 2022, will test the official Ninja ZX-10RR on Tuesday, August 29. He has great experience in the WorldSBK paddock and also in the EWC series.
The Frenchman will be accompanied on the track by the MTM Kawasaki WorldSSP rider, Adrian Huertas, in recognition of his WorldSSP300 championship victory on a Kawasaki in 2021 and his increasingly strong performances since moving to WorldSSP racing in 2022.
For the rest, in the absence of Yamaha, we are waiting for Ducati with Alvaro Bautista et Michael Ruben Rinaldi (Aruba.it Racing – Ducati), Danilo Petrucci (Barni Spark Racing Team), Axel Bassani (Motocorsa Racing) and Philipp Oettl (Team GoEleven), Honda with Iker Lecuona and his teammate Xavi Verge (Team HRC), and BMW with Scott Redding et Michael van der Mark (ROKiT BMW Motorrad WorldSBK Team), as well as Garrett gerloff and his teammate Loris Baz (Bonovo Action BMW).
Jonathan Rhea : “This Aragon test comes at a very useful time, as Magny Cours is quickly approaching after a long summer break, and it is always beneficial to get back into the swing and flow of riding my ZX-10RR. I will try to get back into rhythm, while keeping an eye on the Motorland race weekend, which will take place shortly after the Magny Cours race. So it's about trying to build this last part of the season and be strong. We will continue to test some elements that we have already tried. We only have one day left to use my essay allotment. We expect it to be hot, which is also a good thing to try to further improve the settings of our bikes. We will continue to work. The next three rounds will come in quick succession, so it is important to be operational. We'll see what the KMC engineers have to offer and get to work during testing. »
alex lowes : “There will be things for 2024 that we will test, just a few ideas. This will take half a day, as we only have one full day of testing left. The other half of the day will be spent getting up to speed and trying a couple of things on the rear of the bike, to try to improve the grip on the sidewalls. Marcel, my team leader, has some ideas and I talked a lot with him about an improvement plan. I hope the conditions will be warm. That’s the goal and I can’t wait to get back to work. It wasn't the best round at Autodrom Most for me recently, but we have four rounds left. I want to return to the podiums to end the year in style. There are some good tracks coming up for me and the Kawasaki. We didn't meet our goals at the start of the year, so a good end to the year will be necessary to prepare us for next year. We have an eye on 2024, an eye on the final four rounds of this season and some ideas from Marcel to improve things. The testing day will therefore be busy since we only have one day left. It will be good to get back on the bike before Magny Cours. »
Guim Roda (KRT team director): “We are getting back to work after the Autodrom Most race weekend. This test will be a good opportunity to prepare for Magny Cours and the last rounds of the year, and at the same time we will introduce new ideas to improve the bike for the 2024 season. Unfortunately, the year we had the most need, we can only test for 10 days. We've already used nine days, so even though we'll be on the track for two days, Jonathan and Alex will only test one day each. We will work with Florian Marino on the first day, and we will give Adrian Huertas the opportunity to test the WorldSBK bike, to see its capabilities. We promised him in Most that if he got on the podium in WorldSSP, we would give him the opportunity to test. He didn't make the podium, but we ultimately felt he deserved the chance, so let's see how he handles it. »
