[Ducati] World Superbike Donnington Preview

[Veloce916 at aol.com]

Thursday Mar 29 2007 
Preview  

WORLD SUPERBIKE CELEBRATES TWENTY YEARS AT DONINGTON 

Donington (UK), Thursday 29 March: Donington Park will roar to the sound of  
World Superbikes this weekend for the first time since 2001 as the European  
Round of the championship takes place at the East Midlands circuit. Six years  
on, the event holds special significance because it was 20 years ago, almost  
exactly to the day, that the World Superbike championship began. 
Despite winning the first of his two WSBK titles that very same year, the  
Ducati Xerox Team's Troy Bayliss had a difficult time at Donington in 2001 and  
the Australian could only manage to string together a 13th and a 9th place in  
the two races after struggling with tyre problems. Troy goes into the third  
round of this year's championship with one race win under his belt as he  
attempts to make up the 26 points on the current series leader and local  
favourite, James Toseland (Honda). 
Troy Bayliss, 3rd in championship (64  points)
Troy Bayliss has been to Donington numerous times in British  Superbike, 
World Superbike and in MotoGP and rates it as one of his favourite  circuits.  
"The last time I rode there was in MotoGP in 2005 and it was a new surface  
but I crashed out in the rain. I've got fond memories of Donington and I do 
like  racing there, especially the Old Hairpin part of the circuit, but I've 
never had  the results I'd like to have had - like a double win! We're going to go 
there  and give it a shot and all we can hope for is we get a lucky break 
with the  weather in England. This time of year we could have anything, there was 
even  snow a few years back! Last year at this point in the championship, I 
only had  one win, so I'm pretty much on track. It's a tough schedule ahead 
with five  rounds in Europe in the next two months, but I'm in good shape, 
everyone's  working well in the team and we're looking forward to kicking on." 
Lorenzo Lanzi, 6th in championship (44  points)
Lorenzo Lanzi has only raced once at Donington, back in 2001  with a 250 GP 
team, but is confident that he can continue his positive start to  the season 
this weekend. 
"I have already raced at Donington once, in 2001 with 250 GP but I haven't  
been there for six years. That's a long time and the conditions will 
undoubtedly  be difficult at this time of year. I quite like the circuit, it's very  
technical, very quick the first part and just plain slow the second so for sure  
we will give the brakes a good workout at Donington. As for the championship,  
it's a pity about the electrical problem I had in Superpole at Phillip Island 
 because we could have had another good race. However as a start to the 
season  goes, it hasn't been bad, now we're going to Donington to try and make up 
for  points we lost in the race in Australia." 
20 Years Ago
The World Superbike  championship got underway with a round at Donington 
twenty years ago on April  3rd 1988. The two winners on the day were current 
Ducati Xerox team manager  Davide Tardozzi on a Bimota and Marco Lucchinelli 
(Ducati), but the overall win  went to ‘Lucky' as race results were combined for the 
first, last and only time  in World Superbike history. In the nineteen 
editions since then there have been  a total of 11 champions and 55 different race 
winners, with Carl Fogarty (4  titles and 59 wins) topping the lists ahead of 
double champions Troy Bayliss and  Troy Corser (35 and 33 wins respectively). 
To celebrate the anniversary an array  of stars, including former champion Fred 
Merkel (Honda) and 2003 winner Neil  Hodgson (Ducati), will be riding their 
original race bikes on parade laps on  Saturday and Sunday. 
The Circuit
Name: Donington Park Grand Prix Circuit
Length: 4.023  km
Pole Position: left
Finish line length: 564 m
Corners left/right:  5/7
Race distance: 23 laps/92.529 km 
Statistics : Best lap: Fogarty (Ducati) 1m32.121s (1999). Lap record: Corser  
(Ducati) 1m33.470s (1996). Superpole: Edwards (Honda), 1m32.559s (2000). 
2006 Results : no race
2001 Results : Race 1 - 1. Hodgson (Ducati); 2.  Chili (Suzuki); 3. Hislop 
(Ducati). Race 2 - 1. Chili; 2. Hodgson; 3. Corser  (Aprilia). 
TV Coverage : Eurosport (Europe): Sunday 1 April, 1100 GMT race 1 (live).  
British Eurosport (UK): Saturday 31st March, 2000 Superpole (delayed). Sunday 1  
April, 1200 race 1 (live), 1530 race 2 (live). Eurosport 2 (Europe): Saturday 
31  March, 1500 Superpole (live). Eurosport (Italy): Sunday 1 April, 1300 
race 1  (live). La7 (Italy): Saturday 31 March, 1650 Superpole (live), Sunday 1 
April,  1250 race 1 (live), 1620 race 2 (live). 




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