Team Umbria Bike rider Matteo Baiocco took his second race win of the season today at the sixth round of the FIM Superstock 1000 Cup. The 23 year old Italian had shown good form all weekend on his YZF-R1, taking the first pole of his Superstock career yesterday. Baiocco led both parts of the two-heat race from start to finish in a textbook ride to retake the lead in the championship from Aitchison.
Baiocco got a good start in the first heat and broke away from the pack with Simeon right behind. The race was then red flagged on lap four after Badovini’s bike leaked fluid on the track before bursting into flames. With the race reduced to nine laps from fourteen, Baiocco went on to repeat his good start in the second heat to take the race win and twenty five points. Today’s win comes only one week after Baiocco’s win in the national Italian championship at Vallelunga last week.
Yamaha Team Italia rider Claudio Corti also had an exciting race finishing fourth after starting in ninth. He suffered a minor elbow injury at the start of the weekend when he crashed in practice on Friday but went on to take six seconds off his time during the qualifying sessions to start on the second row. In the first heat he started well and moved up to third before the red flag. In the second heat he battled throughout the race for fourth, where he eventually finished.
Corti’s team mate Michele Pirro struggled in today’s race after crashing in qualifying yesterday, losing valuable time in which to find the right set-up. Although he was the fastest rider in Friday’s practice, the young rider could only manage a qualifying position of 19th, which he found hard to come back from in the start/stop race.
Baiocco now leads the championship on 95 points with an eight point lead back to Aitchison. Corti lies in sixth on 64 points with team mate Pirro right behind in seventh on 59 points.
Matteo Baiocco (1st - Team Umbria Bike)
“I knew I was fast from the first free practice session on Friday. Simeon tried to make my life hard in the race but I closed all his windows of opportunity to pass me. The bike was sliding so much with very little grip but I’m fortunate that I won. I don’t want to think about leading the championship again though, because I want to stay focused and on fighting form. “
Claudio Corti (4th - Yamaha Team Italia) “I started badly and I struggled because of my bad set up. I lost set-up time because of my crash on Friday and we paid for it today. I tried to attack Dionisi on the last lap today but I couldn’t get past. I hope to have a better result here in the national championship round here next weekend and I will use it as an opportunity to sort out some of the issues we had today. “
Michele Pirro (13th - Yamaha Team Italia)
“Today was very difficult because I started from a way back on the grid, not up the front like normal. My target was to finish in the top ten but that proved impossible. I tried to push but I couldn’t due to the bad set-up I had caused by the lack of set-up time I had after crashing in qualifying. I didn’t want to crash again today and so couldn’t really push for positions. “
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