05 Jul 2016 ZIC Superbike-Race 2：Mark scores win number two

At 1:30 p.m. on Sunday 19 June, the ZIC Superbike combined race is held at Zhuhai International Circuit. Today the 600cc and 1000cc machines race together. This race will give the faster young riders more experience racing with faster bikes.

According to the results from yesterday, Mark Aitchison is on pole position, Huang Shi-Zhao starts second with Li Zheng-Peng in third place. Zhang Wei-An, Mohd Radzi bin Yusof and Rajini Krishnan are on the second row.

At 1:35 p.m. the 10 laps race begins and Mark Aitchison raced into the lead. Huang Shi-Zhao is able to hold down second place while Zhang Wei-An takes third place. Li Zheng-Peng did not make a smooth start.

On lap 2, #22 loses control and falls in the sand trap. The rider gets up and walks away. The marshals move in and clears the bike. Mark Aitchison s lead has grown to 6 seconds, Huang Shi-Zhao is second and Zhang Wei-An runs in third place.

On lap 5, #65 hesitates in a corner and is slightly confused with his lines. The bikes behind are influenced by him and hits him from behind. Luckily they do not fall down, he is able to re-join the race after getting up. By now, Li Zheng-Peng is up to 8th place.

On lap 7, one of the bikes falls on the grass at the outside of a corner. The position of the bike is dangerous. The rider wants to right the bike and continue. But the bike cannot start. At the same time, Li Zheng-Peng has risen to fourth place. But he is now 7 seconds behind Rajini Krishnan and may run out of laps to catch him.

On the last lap, Mark has a lead of over 20 seconds while Huang Shi-Zhao is still in second place, with Rajini Krishnan running third. Li Zheng-Peng is 5 seconds behind in fourth. At the flag, Mark wins again, Huang takes second. Krishnan is third and first in Open B class. Li Zheng-Peng finished fourth overall.

After the race, Huang Shi-Zhao expressed satisfaction about today s race. “Overall I am quite happy. The only regret is that my teammate had a poor start. Today the weather was too hot and created many problems for the bike. After 3 laps the tyres lose grip and begins to slip. The high temperature affected the front suspension also and it is not good in cornering. I almost could not feel the front tyre. Fortunately we still finish second. Thanks to Yamaha MLT for their hard work all week. For the next Pan Delta race in September we will make more adjustments in order to perform better.”

Li Zheng-Peng could only finish second in class today due to a poor start. “At the start my bike could not start, I could only start the bike with my mechanics help when everyone else have reached turn 1. There were too many slow bikes in the race and they were obstacles to me. It was a tough race today. I am disappointed with the start problem. If there was another lap or a little more time maybe I could get the class win. But that is how the race is.”

Open B class winner Rajini Krishnan said, “Yesterday there was a technical problem with the bike that we still cannot resolve today. The weather was too hot and the bike slips a lot. But we can get to the podium so the result is very good. I would like to thank Kawasaki for their support.”

Open Class B third place finisher Simon Kwan is very happy. “Today s rae was tough because of the hot weather. Also there were some problems with my bike. The electronic traction control system had a problem, it was activated every time I entered a corner, preventing me from going full throttle on the exit. It lost me sometime. The lap time was lower than normal. Fortunately I still got a good result. There were many slower bikes due to the mixed race. I did not encounter this problem yesterday and it was a little dangerous. I had to be careful overtaking the backmarkers. Overall I am very satisfied.”