Progress despite minor problems

The opening day of the fourth round of this year’s World Superbike Championship was beset by minor problems – though mostly not of Team Bimota Alstare’s making. 

The afternoon session was red-flagged twice but not because of any accident or bike problems. The first time was because of smoke on the track and second was because of a loose drain cover in one of the corners. The interruptions prevented Bimota Alstare riders Ayrton Badovini and Christian progressing as quickly as they had wanted and so some of this afternoons’ work will have to be carried out tomorrow instead.

Ayrton Badovini – 15^th, 1:50.228

“I like Imola because it is a great place to ride  - an ‘old style’ track – and I enjoy it a lot. Today was a bit strange though because of the interruptions. These broke the rhythm and stopped us from making smooth progress. There were about twelve minutes left of the final session and we had some things to try. But then all track activity was cancelled for the day, so we didn’t get a chance to try our new ideas out.

I am not completely happy because we haven’t found a good set-up yet and a good set-up is vital for this track. We are working a lot on the electronics and trying to have good settings in all the different types of corners, but this is not easy when you have so many interruptions. If we can find good settings for this track, I am sure we can be the best EVO bike out there.” 

Christian Iddon – 17^th, 1:50.669

“Because of a few issues, my morning session was a bit of a dead-loss. It’s a shame because this is such a cool track to ride and I was looking forward to finding a good set-up. The bike felt very soft in the rear end this morning and was hard to ride, but we fixed that problem pretty quickly and I was very optimistic about the afternoon session. For me, it was going to be an important session, but it turned out a strange one because of the stoppages.

Imola is a very particular circuit and there are many corners that you take in the same gear, but at completely different speeds, so you have to get the electronics working really well to go through them the best possible way. It is all to do with gearing and engine braking and the bike doing the right thing at the right place. This track is a real compromise, so getting the best setting for all of it is very important if you want to put in good laps.”