As round seven of the 13 round Supersport World Championship comes around Joan Lascorz approaches the USA determined to go for a race win and get back into the championship lead.
Lascorz rode as hard and as well as he has done all year at the previous round in South Africa but still finished off the podium for the first time, in fifth place. He lost his championship lead last time out but such is the intensity of the battle between Joan, Kenan Sofuoglu and Eugene Laverty that there are only five points between all three of them after six rounds.
For Katsuaki Fujiwara (Kawasaki Motocard.com) the 2010 season has featured a few ups and downs, but despite some desperate bad luck at key times, Fujiwara has recovered his true pace on his Ninja ZX-6R. ‘Kats’ hopes to mount his first successful podium attack of the 2010 season in America.
This weekend is a unique one for the WSS riders, as raceday is Monday, 31 May, to coincide with the local Memorial Day federal holiday.
The 4.907km Miller Motorsport Park is an impressive facility that both Joan and Katsuaki have intimate knowledge of, having raced there last year on Ninja ZX-6R Kawasaki machinery. Joan was fourth (only 1.833 seconds from the winner) and Katsuaki was 13th.
Joan Lascorz: “We are looking forward to America and are completely ready to take our revenge for Kyalami. We lost good points at the last round but we did our best. We are all working hard and we should be back up front again in America. I was on pole there last year and will be focused on trying to take the race win. The championship is very close so we have to keep going for wins to get into the lead again.”
Katsuaki Fujiwara: “We had some issues at the previous round but we are looking at Miller, a very different track, to make up more ground. At Miller you can take wide lines so it is very different from Kyalami. Last year Joan took pole position in America and with a good set-up this year we can do well. I think Miller will be a better track for both of us than the last one was.”