Superbike, Phillip Island Round, Race2: difficult weekend for the Red Bull Honda team

One of the biggest topics of interest on the eve of the Yamaha Finance Australian Round was the Honda team, which debuted this season with a new bike, the eagerly awaited Honda CBR1000RR Fireblade SP2, a new sponsor, Red Bull, and a new pair of both former MotoGP riders, Stefan Bradl arriving this year alongside Nicky Hayden.

The checkered flag also waved on Race 2, we can say that it was a very complicated start to the season for the new Red Bull Honda team and not only for the final results of the two heats, with the best placing represented by Hayden's eleventh place in the first race, but also as an absolute performance, given that the two CBRs were never able to stay with the leading group, in a round where no large gaps were seen.

Stefan Bradl finished both races in fifteenth place, Nicky Hayden, after having almost reached the top 10 in the first, suffered a fall on lap nine and despite trying to get back on his Honda CBR1000RR Fireblade SP2 he was unable to continue the race .

The second round of the season will take place in just two weeks at the Chang International Circuit in Thailand: we'll see if Bradl and Hayden will be able to redeem the dull Australian performance.

“My start today was worse than yesterday's: to be honest it wasn't the start itself, but I took a wrong line at the entrance to Turn 1 and obviously I wasn't able to fix it in Turn 2. This means that I lost the advantage I had gained and had to give up a couple of positions" – he commented Stefan bradl – “We made some changes to the bike before the race especially at the front, which turned out to be a positive choice. Unfortunately, while the entry angle was good and I could be aggressive on the brakes, we were lacking on corner exit. We are also too hard on the tires at the moment and that meant that by the end of the race I couldn't keep the pace. All in all, it wasn't an easy weekend but I'm sure we will be able to improve for Thailand."

“We made some changes in order to preserve the tires a little more, especially with the warmer conditions today, which was better when I had to get on the gas, but it penalized the brakes a little bit” – he declared Nicky Hayden – “I didn't have the same good start as yesterday, but I didn't feel too bad. I set my fastest lap of the race and was improving while trying to stay with the second group, but I pushed too hard in Lukey Heights and crashed. Obviously I can't say I'm happy with the results and the weekend in general: today I did my best and it annoys me that we weren't able to do what we had planned. We will try to turn the situation around for Thailand."