Fourth place start for F.C.C. TSR Honda France at the 24H SPA EWC Motos
Circuit de Spa-FrancorchampsThe second round of the 2022 FIM Endurance World Championship takes place at the legendary 6.985-kilometre Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps from 2-5 June 2022 with the 24H SPA EWC Motos.
F.C.C. TSR Honda France claimed the fourth fastest time aboard the Honda CBR1000RR-R Fireblade SP ahead of tomorrow’s 24-hour race, confident and determined to fight for the victory and repeat another podium as in the 24 Heures Motos.
The combined qualifying times, taking into account only the two best times, gave the Honda’s endurance specialists Josh Hook, Gino Rea and Mike Di Meglio, an average lap of 2:20.223.
On Thursday, free practice and first qualifying sessions were on tricky hot track conditions, where Hook and Rea finished first and second respectively in their sessions. Di Meglio was sixth as he saved his qualifying tyre for better track conditions on Friday.
Hook and Di Meglio improved their lap times on Friday thanks to a cooler track condition. The Frenchman was faster by more than a second compared to the day before, but unfortunately, he crashed during his qualifying session. Rea also had a crash in his second qualifying session that prevented him to improved his lap time.
National Motos Honda set the third-best lap time in their category, 2:24.349. On Thursday, the Honda #55 had an excellent first qualifying session with consistent lap times for the three riders, but on Friday, for the second qualifying, the team changed the setting and tested another tyres. The results were not as good as expected, and the French team will be back to the previous settings for the 24-hour race.
The Swiss brothers Sebastien and Valentin Suchet, and Frenchman Guillaume Raymond will fight for another podium aboard the Fireblade SP as they did in the last race.
Privateers Honda RAC 41 Chromeburner signed the ninth fastest lap in the Superstock category. This weekend, it is a bit more complicated for the team as Chris Leesh and Wayne Tessels are sharing the saddle of the Honda #41 with a new rider, Eddy Dupuy, who is discovering the Fireblade.
The 24H SPA EWC Motos race will be flagged off at 1pm (CEST) on Saturday 4th June and finished at 1pm (CEST) on Sunday 5th June.
'Today is a difficult day for us. However, in the night practice and the first qualifying session, we performed well and consistently in different conditions, so we remained confident about our race pace. It's going to be a very difficult race here. Some corners are very dark at night, and the weather forecast is quite bad. We will have to be careful and have a relaxed riding style.'
Yesterday, we had very hot temperatures, so we didn't necessarily want to focus on performance as we had high hopes for this morning's session with a cooler track. But unfortunately, it didn't go as well as expected. For me, we had some challenges with the team strategy, the red flags and tyres management. But we are confident for the race because we have a very good race pace, and I am sure we can fight for the victory.'
'I'm a bit disappointed because I didn't use a qualifying tyre yesterday, knowing that the conditions would be better today. I had to start with the used tyre to match Gino's pace. But after his crash, I had to take the race bike, and I lacked some pace. After the red flag, I attacked to improve, but I also crashed. I'm sorry for the team who will have a lot of work to do. I hope that these crashes will not cause any problems during the race.'
