“You always wish good luck…, but I wouldn’t mind less misfortune to start with.”
A difficult weekend at the MotoLand Aragón and the third round of the MOTUL FIM Superbike world championship is over. The third and last day of the Motocard Aragón Round started with a good feeling for Markus Reiterberger. After the crash he suffered at the start of the race one yesterday, it was not sure this morning how the 25 years-old would feel. But he felt fit enough and also got the “Go” from the medical centre to take part in the races. The warm up went great and eight to ten really fast laps got “Reiti” the fifth position. He started the 10-lap-sprintrace with confidence. The BMW Motorrad WorldSBK Team had done some changes to the transmission, because of the strong wind in Aragón and it felt good for Markus Reiterberger. Unfortunately he was not able to draw on to the good feeling of the Warm up and lost time lap by lap. Due to a problem with the primary gear of the BMW S 1000 RR, Reiterberger had to give up after five laps and could not finish the race.
Because of the “DNF” the second race had to be started from eleventh position on the grid. Again there was an incident at the start and Reiterberger got touched by another rider (this time by Michael van der Mark). After the first shock he recovered fast and started with his catch up. He almost had a highside-crash in turn three, which repeated in the following lap. Something was wrong and “Reiti” decided just to finish the race and to try to take as many points with him as possible. Now he and his team have to analyse what went wrong and start all over again in Assen in just one week time.
Markus Reiterberger #28; DNF + P15:
“I felt surprisingly fit this morning, despite the crash yesterday and I also got the OK from the medical centre to start the races. I had a really good feeling with the bike during the Warm up and had eight to ten really fast laps. We changed something with the transmission for the race, as the wind got really strong here in Aragón. We hoped for some fights in the slipstream. The first few laps felt good, but not as good as during the Warm up. I lost about two tenth of a second during each lap. Then we had a problem with the primary gear and I had to park the bike. We don’t know the reason yet. Because of the DNF I had to start the second race from the back, out of eleventh grid position. And again another rider touched me during the start, which was a shock at first. I almost crashed highsiding the bike in turn three and that happened again one lap later. I only wanted to finish that race then and try to get some points for the championship. Now we have to analyse what was going on and start all over again in Assen.”
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