Davies fights with his Ducati to fifth

Chaz Davies says he feels he has to fight his Aruba.it Racing Ducati to see improvements after making a small recovery to fifth place in race two at Donington Park.

The Welsh rider endured a frustrating opener at his home round down in eighth place which he felt was his maximum after turning stability and grip issues plagued his pace.

Having found useful set-up tweaks Davies improved to fifth place, having lost vital time during the first corner fights, but concedes the progress didn’t meet expectations.

“It was better than yesterday and I enjoyed the race a lot more than yesterday at least I could put up a fight today,” Davies said. “I could keep up with the front group which was nice to see.

“I got pushed a bit wide at the first corner and didn’t get a good run to go down the hill for the first lap and that put me quite far back, six seconds off, but then I closed up to four and a bit seconds at the end.

“The pace wasn’t bad but we lost a bit at the beginning and used a bit of tyre at the start so our bike becomes very difficult at the end. That was as good as it was going to get.”

Davies was the only Ducati rider to crack the top ten at Donington Park, with teammate Marco Melandri a distant 11^th place in race two while both Michael Ruben Rinaldi and Xavi Fores failed to finish, and feels they are all suffering equally but he’s wrestling with his Panigale R to extract performance.

“If one guy is clearing off into the distance then we would need to look at something in package that we can do here but some guys were saying it was unrideable today,” he said. “Mine was never that bad but I feel like we are fighting a lot at the minute, fighting to put the bike where I want it and fighting to get the results that we are used to achieving.”

Davies has slipped to 64 points off of World Superbike championship leader Jonathan Rea after the Donington Park round as the elusive maiden world title for the V-twin Panigale R continues to slide away.