FIM Endurance World Championship/8 Hours EWC Oschersleben
Motorsports Arena Oschersleben, Germany
June 8, 2019
Final Qualifying Results:
1. Team SRC Kawasaki France (Jeremy Guarnoni 1:26.324/David Checa 1:27.057/Erwan Nigon 1:26.264), Kaw ZX-10R, Superbike, 1:26.548
2. Honda Endurance Racing (Randy De Puniet 1:26.772/Yonny Hernandez 1:26.180/Sebastien Gimbert 1:26.886), Hon CBR1000RR SP2, Superbike, 1:26.612
3. Suzuki Endurance Racing Team (Vincent Philippe 1:26.785/Etienne Masson 1:26.822/Gregg Black 1:26.693), Suz GSX-R1000, Superbike, 1:26.766
4. WEPOL Racing (Michael Laverty 1:26.933/Sheridan Morais 1:26.161/Danny Webb 1:27.444), Yam YZF-R1, Superbike, 1:26.846
5. YART Yamaha (Broc Parkes 1:26.893/Marvin Fritz 1:26.899/Niccolo Canepa 1:26.915), Yam YZF-R1, Superbike, 1:26.902
6. F.C.C. TSR Honda France (Josh Hook 1:26.753/Freddy Foray 1:27.029/Mike Di Meglio 1:27.247), Hon CBR1000RR SP2, Superbike, 1:27.009
7. Team ERC-BMW Motorrad Endurance (Kenny Foray 1:26.269/Julian Da Costa 1:27.437/Mathieu Gines 1:27.403), BMW S1000RR, Superbike, 1:27.036
8. VRD IGOL PIERRET EXPERIENCES (Florian Alt 1:27.102/Florian Marino 1:27.321/Xavier Simeon 1:26.902), Yam YZF-R1, Superbike, 1:27.108
9. Wojcik Racing Team (Gino Rea 1:27.769/Christoffer Bergman 1:27.619), Yam YZF-R1, Superbike, 1:27.694
10. GERT56 by GS YUASA (Stefan Kerschbaumer 1:27.483/Lucy Glockner 1:27.515/Pepijn Bijsterbosch 1:28.156), BMW S1000RR, Superstock, 1:27.718
29. GSM Racing (Vladimir Leonov 1:27.549/Bjorn Estment 1:29.892/Brandon Cretu 1:31.609), Suz GSX-R1000, Superbike, 1:29.683
More, from a press release issued by FIM/Eurosport Events:
SRC KAWASAKI RETAIN POLE
Despite the best efforts of Honda Endurance Racing, who moved up to 2nd position on the grid, Team SRC Kawasaki France kept the upper hand and will start from pole tomorrow at the 8 Hours of Oschersleben.
Team SRC Kawasaki France’s three riders Jérémy Guarnoni, David Checa and Erwan Nigon, who have been very competitive since yesterday, reaffirmed their status as pole-sitter on the starting grid of the 8 Hours of Oschersleben.
The wind clearly threw riders off their stride at the Motorsport Arena this morning, but it did not stop Honda Endurance Racing improving their best laps. Randy de Puniet, Yonny Hernández and Sébastien Gimbert wrested second position on the grid, just ahead of Suzuki Endurance Racing Team and Wepol Racing (Yamaha), the only privateer faster than factory-backed squads, YART Yamaha, F.C.C. TSR Honda France and VRD Igol Pierret Expériences. With very small gaps between the riders, this race will be closely fought. The average of their riders’ best lap times, which determines starting grid positions, has all eight teams within the same second.
Cup at stake for GERT56
Wójcik Racing Team are in 9th place on the grid, ahead of GERT56 by GS Yuasa, the top Superstock. The German team lead the FIM Endurance World Cup standings and are well placed to win their first World Cup in front of a home crowd at Oschersleben.
In the Superstock category, GERT56 by GS Yuasa are ahead of Team 33 Coyote Louit Moto and No Limits Motor Team on the grid, while the other challengers in this class (Junior Team LMS Suzuki, BMRT 3D Maccio Racing and Moto Ain) are beyond the 15th slot.
Following the warm-up starting at 9am in Germany, the 8 Hours of Oschersleben will be flagged off at 1pm.
More, from a press release issued by Honda Endurance Racing:
Honda Endurance Racing qualify second at the 8 Hours of Oschersleben
8 Hours of Oschersleben
Motorsport Arena Oschersleben, Germany
The Honda Endurance Racing team has taken the second spot on the grid for the fourth round of the 2018/2019 FIM Endurance World Championship, the 8 Hours of Oschersleben in Germany. Randy de Puniet, Sébastien Gimbert and Yonny Hernandez missed out on pole position by just 0.064 seconds. The reigning World Champions F.C.C. TSR Honda France with Josh Hook, Freddy Foray and Mike di Meglio placed their Honda CBR1000RR Fireblade SP2 sixth on the grid ahead of tomorrow’s eight-hour race.
The qualifying result was the best of the season for the Honda Endurance Racing team, which saw Hernandez – who until this weekend hadn’t ridden the Oschersleben track before – top his session this morning, setting the second fastest time overall of the event.
Reigning World Champions F.C.C. TSR Honda France qualified in sixth position, only 0.4 seconds behind the leaders.
The race is scheduled to start tomorrow (9 June), at 13:00 Local Time (BST +1) with the chequered flag to be waved at 21:00 after eight hours on-track.
To keep up to date with Honda’s journey throughout the eight-hour race, follow Honda Pro Racing on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
More, from a press release issued by Honda Racing:
Honda Endurance Racing misses out Oschersleben pole by 0.064 seconds
8 Hours of Oschersleben
Motorsport Arena Oschersleben, Germany
The Honda Endurance Racing team has had its best Qualifying in years at the Motorsport Arena Oschersleben for the fourth round of the 2018/2019 FIM Endurance World Championship. Randy de Puniet, Sébastien Gimbert and Yonny Hernandez just missed out on pole position by 0.064 seconds, and will start tomorrow’s 8 Hours of Oschersleben in second place aboard the Honda CBR1000RR Fireblade SP2.
Most of the teams opted for a new set of tyres for this morning’s qualifying session and so did the Honda crew. Working on optimising the set-up of the Fireblade, the team made some big changes for de Puniet’s first session, but with the changes not affective the team reverted back to the original set-up.
Proving to be the right decision, Hernandez topped the times in his session in P1 with a best time of 1:26.180, making him the fastest rider of the day and second quickest in both sessions. Unfortunately no new tyre was left for Gimbert, who was still quick giving the team confidence for tomorrow’s eight-hour race.
The race is scheduled to start tomorrow (9 June), at 13:00 Local Time (BST +1) with the chequered flag to be waved at 21:00 after eight hours on-track.
For all the real time race updates and team news follow @HondaRacingCBR on Twitter.
Randy de Puniet 111
It was not a bad day. In Q2 we decided to change the set up of the bike, but unfortunately went in the wrong direction and still I did my lap time like this. But we needed to give that a try. Yonny after that came back with the bike of yesterday and did a really good lap time. Unfortunately he rode too much on the track and Séb had to start with the used tyres and he was not able to improve. We are in second position and this is not bad, the bike is also good for tomorrow. All the riders did a great job, were very consistent with good lap times, so we are confident. It will be a tough race, because we will have many lap per stints, but I think we are quite ready.
Yonny Hernandez 111
I am really, really happy because we are now on the record lap times of last year and this is really important for me, because it’s my time on this track. I just try to do a good job. I tried to stay focused on my lap and all the week we try to do a good job. My team has worked out a good set up of the Fireblade, especially for race pace. Yesterday I was not so fast because I focused just to ride on the old tyres, so I did my lap time with the old tyres and just tried to make a good race pace and I think for tomorrow we have the confidence and we have a good pace to try to fight again for the top.
Sébastien Gimbert 111
Today has been frustrating because we have a tyre sticker limitation and I honestly did not have a chance to improve after Yonny and Randy had used this one in their sessions already. I pushed, but I knew the lap time was not going to come, so I prefer to stop early and not to risk a crash. The Fireblade is good, just now it is necessary to work for the race. Our position after qualifying is really good and we can look confident to the race. Yesterday my lap time was good, so today I am not happy because I could not show my potential on our Fireblade. But this will be another story in the race!
Jonny Twelvetrees
Team Manager
I think, it has been our best qualifying for many years, so from that side it is good. We made a few little mistakes, that could have bought us a bit more time. I think, we are willing to accept that, as there were things that we were testing, just to be sure before the race. So some things didn’t work and then also when we start with the qualifying yesterday, Randy crashed on some oil down on the track and with a lot of other riders. I think we damaged one tyre there because it cooled down and then we had to re-heat it again and it messed up our tyre strategy for the Qualifying as well. I think there was a bit more time that we could have had but we got to be happy with the best qualifying of years and that proves we have got the pace.
More, from a press release issued by Yamaha Racing:
YART Yamaha Take Fifth Place in Tight Oschersleben Qualifying
The YART Yamaha EWC Team will start in fifth place for round four of the FIM EWC at the 8 Hours Oschersleben, after strong laps by riders Broc Parkes, Marvin Fritz and Niccolò Canepa on the YART R1 saw them finish just 0.3s from pole.
At the end of Friday’s first qualifying sessions the YART trio finished in sixth place, improving by 0.2 in the first qualifying sessions and all lapping consistently in the 1’26s. They then found even more time for final qualifying and were able to secure a competitive fifth ahead of the penultimate round.
Electing to run their race tyre for qualifying runs, the YART team have proven race pace at the track and will be aiming to repeat their impressive win at the 8 Hours of Slovakia in May.
The team earn one bonus point for finishing fifth in qualifying, and sit fourth in the standings with the title race still open.
Yamaha extended support teams also performed well on Saturday. WEPOL Racing and VRD Igol Pierret Experiences Yamaha both qualified within the top eight, with 3ART Moto Team 95 and Moto Ain finishing inside the top half of the grid.
Tomorrow’s race at the Motorsport Arena Oschersleben begins at 13:00 CET.
Broc Parkes
YART Yamaha EWC Team
“I’m pretty happy with my lap today. We were on the race tyre for qualifying today which wasn’t representative of our true pace, but we are feeling good for the race. We have been consistent all weekend and we’re looking to build on our strong performance at Slovakia. The bonus point from fifth in qualifying is important too and hopefully we’ll score again on Sunday. The track was a little damp this morning but we expect it to be dry tomorrow, and I’m really looking forward to lights out.”
Marvin Fritz
YART Yamaha EWC Team
“We worked hard on our setup yesterday. Our times improved a lot over the weekend and got quicker each time we rode, and we were able to qualify fifth which was a good effort. It rained a lot last night which made the track harder to ride, and we decided to use race tyres for qualifying which gave us some really useful data. Our pace on the race tyre is strong and everyone is confident for a good result tomorrow.”
Niccolò Canepa
YART Yamaha EWC Team
“It has been a strong practice and qualifying for us. We felt good coming into this round from Slovakia and all weekend we have had good pace. Qualifying was tough and there are lots of quick teams here who can fight for the podium, but I can’t wait to get racing. We start fifth tomorrow which is competitive, and we are ready to fight for another win.”
Mandy Kainz
YART Yamaha EWC Team Manager
“Qualifying was tight today, and with the top seven covered by less than 0.5s we know the race will be a tough fight too. We know that we have a very good package for the race however, the riders have been consistent all weekend and by qualifying with the race tyres today we have some very useful data to work with overnight. The weather should be dry too but we know that we are also quick in mixed weather. With fifth place we get an extra point which is really important for the championship, and we are aiming for another big points finish tomorrow.”