BMW Motorrad WorldSBK Team’s hard work goes unrewarded in San Juan on Sunday.

San Juan. BMW Motorrad WorldSBK Team’s hard work went
unrewarded in the Sunday race of the FIM Superbike World
Championship (WorldSBK) in San Juan (ARG). Tom Sykes (GBR) finished
in ninth place on his BMW S 1000 RR in the Superpole race, but then
a technical issue forced him to retire from the second race in the
afternoon. His team-mate Markus Reiterberger (GER) finished in
17th and 16th place. The ‘Circuito San Juan
Villicum’ hosted the twelfth and penultimate round of the 2019
WorldSBK season.

 

With considerably cooler temperatures, the track conditions on Sunday
were much better than on the previous days. Sykes started the
Superpole race in the afternoon from 13th on the grid. He
moved up into eighth place right after the start. He lost one place,
but crossed the finish line in ninth place after a hotly contested
race, which saw him secure a start position on the third row of the
grid for the second main race in the afternoon. Reiterberger finished
in 17th place in the Superpole race, which was his start
position for the afternoon race.

 

The hopes of Sykes moving up the field from ninth on the grid came to
nothing. He initially dropped down the field slightly, before he was
forced to park his motorcycle at the edge of the track on the seventh
lap. Reiterberger was embroiled in several duels at the rear of the
field and in 16th place missed out on finishing in the
points by just 0.1 seconds.

 

The finale of the 2019 WorldSBK season will be held in two weeks’
time, in Qatar from 24th to 26th October.

 

Quotes after race two at San Juan.

 

Marc Bongers, BMW Motorrad Motorsport Director: “It
was a difficult end to a disappointing weekend. Unfortunately, we
retired from the main race as a result of a technical issue with the
clutch. However, we have to be realistic and say that we were never
going to get a good result. We just didn’t understand why we were so
far behind and what we needed to do to remedy the issue. We didn’t
have consistent track conditions to enable us to find a solution. The
track was catastrophic on the first day, okay yesterday morning, then
extremely hot in the afternoon, and this morning it was back to being
acceptable – these conditions meant that the lap times varied
drastically. As a result, we were unable to gradually draw the
necessary conclusions as to which direction we needed to take. We will
now take the data we collected back with us, and will analyse why we
weren’t as competitive as we had hoped this weekend.”

 

Shaun Muir, Team Principal BMW Motorrad WorldSBK
Team:
“Today was probably one of our most difficult days of
the season. On paper, the Superpole race was not so bad for Tom. At
least he managed to get on the third row for the start of the main
race, but with this new model of bike we don’t have any data to work
with, so everything is new for us. With every setting we try, we are
chasing the perfect set-up. All we can do is take all this data with
us and when we come back here again, we will have a better position to
start with. So it’s been really difficult for us, but we must take the
positives and build on this. Markus has also really struggled and
didn’t find a comfortable setting, but we just have to close the book
on this event and re-energise as we get ready for Qatar, where
hopefully we can start on the front foot.”

 

Tom Sykes: “It’s been a difficult weekend. We made
some improvements on the greasy track condition and I honestly felt we
had a consistent race pace during that last race, but we ran into
difficulty with the bike which meant we had to retire. Overall, it’s
been a challenging weekend for the whole BMW Motorrad WorldSBK Team,
but like I said it wasn’t the easiest of track conditions; however,
given the circumstances I feel we gathered some very valuable
information for the future. We will put this weekend behind us and
move on to the next race in Qatar, where hopefully we can take another
step forward.”

 

Markus Reiterberger: “We had much better weather
conditions today. It was cooler, which meant that the racing line on
the track was in a much better state. Unfortunately, I made two
mistakes on the first two laps of the Superpole race and went too
wide. As a result, the race didn’t go well for me, and I crossed the
finish line pretty far down the field. We made a few changes for the
second race, and I felt relatively okay on the bike in the race
itself. Points would have been achievable, and I battled with Sandro
Cortese on the final three laps, but unfortunately, it wasn’t enough
to get the point. Generally, we are still a little bit too slow and we
need to find the reason why. I hope that I will end the season on a
personal high in Qatar. We all pulled together here, and I’m grateful
for that, even if we weren’t rewarded with a good result.”