At the first sector I was 9th and I was being held up by Locatelli and Porto. Porto was being quite tentative and wouldn’t pass Locatelli so I passed him after about ½ a lap. I went up the inside of him into the 6th corner, the left hairpin and went in a bit hot and almost passed/hit Locatelli at the same time!
On the exit of the corner the engine misfired slightly and let Porto and Takahashi back past. I thought it was a bit strange but then it cleared out. At the end of the long back straight there was now a gap between me in 10th, Takahashi in 9th and Loca in 8th.
Because of all the spray it was difficult to see the braking markers on the left of the track, I usually brake between the 250/300 yard marker but couldn’t really see them. I broke at what I thought was the 300 but realised it was the 200!! I went steaming into the hairpin with the back end well and truly skipping around and immediately bridged the gap to Takahashi.
I found the pace was quite slow and was very eager to get passed whoever was in front. At the start of the 2nd lap I passed Takahashi and Locatelli in the first corner. They again both went wide and I did the same as the first lap and went up the inside of them.
Locatelli cut me up and closed the door on me. I could still see that we were still well in touch with the lead group and I felt like I was being held up a lot. I wanted to get passed Locatelli and Porto asap so I didn’t lose touch with the lead group. On the exit of the 2nd corner the engine again spluttered as it did on the first lap but this time it didn’t want to come good.
The bike had stopped revving completely and I was going no where. I tried to clear out the bike but it wouldn’t go above 9000rpm whereas it would usually go to 14,000. So that was it, race over. I was obviously very annoyed and frustrated. I felt like I could have really done some damage in that race and nailed most of the factory bikes but that’s typically the way it goes!
