Superbike Donington: Hayden and Van der Mark comment on Race 2

Superbike, Acerbis UK Round. It was a more complicated weekend than expected for the Honda team, which after the beautiful victory in Sepang with Nicky Hayden, only managed one top five finish with the American.

Michael Van Der Mark was looking for redemption after the dull performances in Imola and Malaysia, but he was unable to go beyond eighth place in both races, also thanks to the rather disappointing qualifying in which he stopped at the SP1, starting from the 12th box.

In Race 2 the Honda riders had a completely different pace: Hayden's pace was very good in the first half of the race, only to then give up due to grip problems, while Van Der Mark fought with Joshua Brookes and Cameron Beaubier for a good part of the race to eighth position, only to have a pace at the end not far from that of the leaders.
Unfortunately, all the ground lost at the start did not allow him to reach Giugliano and try to take seventh position.

“Obviously I can't be happy with sixth position, but I have no excuses, the team did a great job with the bike and the hard tire on the front gave me more stability when braking in the downhill corners” – he explained Nicky Hayden – “In the race I set the fastest lap, also considering qualifying. My pace was much faster than on Saturday, but I simply wasn't fast enough, especially after the halfway point of the race when I had a small technical problem. I also struggled a bit with direction changes, especially when the bike lifted and I had a couple of difficult moments at the Esses. It's a shame, because for a while I thought I could catch Chaz Davies and fight for the podium."

“It was another difficult race for me, similar to yesterday” – declared Michael Van De Mark – “I managed to recover a couple of positions at the start and then I got stuck in the fight for eighth position with Josh Brookes and Cameron Beaubier. I managed to pass them and stay in front, but it wasn't easy. Our starting position on the grid definitely didn't help, but I wouldn't have had the pace to fight for the top 5. There is still a lot of work to do and we will start to do it in Misano. I hope that next week's test can help us find the solution to our problems we've had lately."

The two Honda riders will now be engaged in a day of testing tomorrow, Wednesday 1st June, in view of the Pirelli Riviera di Rimini Round, scheduled at the Misano World Circuit Marco Simoncelli, from 17th to 19th June.