PSG-1 Kawasaki produced one of their best combined performances of the season at the latest World Superbike round at the Nurburgring, with
Regis Laconi and
Makoto Tamada both scoring top ten finishes.
Tamada was the star of the first race, the Japanese rider recovering from a poor start from his 21st place qualifying position to rocket up the order through the tight first corner to place himself on the cusp of the top ten.
From here, Tamada maintained his progress to rise to ninth place at the finish, just behind
Fonsi Nieto, and record his best finish since the Dutch round at Assen.
“I didn't start as I wanted too in race one but I began to recover positions from the 1st corner when I took the inside line,” he said. “In this way I reached a good position from the 1st lap maintaining it for the whole race.
“I had a good feeling with the bike and the temperature was perfect for the tyres I chose. In the middle of the race I started to push even more to reach Nieto but I was at the limit and I didn't want to take the risk and crash.”
It was Laconi's turn to assume the PSG-1 baton in the second race, the Frenchman using his decent starting position of 13th to battle his way up to tenth. He was particularly pleased as he was forced to make changes to his bike following a clutch issue in the first race that left him down in 14th.
“In race 1, I had a problem with the front end which was going down too much whenever I grabbed the clutch entering the corners. I just couldn't be smooth with my movements and it was difficult to take the right trajectory going into the corners.
“The team solved the problem with the clutch in collaboration with Öhlins and the front end became much more manageable specially in changing direction. Unfortunately I didn't make a good start compromising my final result but I'm happy anyway because we improved both the front and the rear of the bike.”
