Kenan Sofuoglu and his Hannspree Ten Kate Honda team-mate, Michele Pirro, will be seeking improvement at this weekend’s (7-9 May) fifth round World Supersport championship race at Monza in Italy. Sofuoglu currently lies in second place in the championship standings after finishing on the podium in all four rounds this year, including a win at Portimao in March. However, the 25-year-old 2007 world champion from Turkey was disappointed to miss out on victory at the previous Assen round, after dominating practice and starting from pole position. Pirro, who took his first World Supersport podium at Portimao, will also be looking for improvement, particularly after crashing out of the last two rounds. The 23-year-old from San Giovanni Rotondo in south-west Italy is particularly keen to perform at the first of three ‘home’ rounds this season. As two-time Italian Superstock champion and reigning Italian Supersport champion , Pirro has plenty of Monza experience and placed seventh in last year’s World Supersport race. Sofuoglu, meanwhile, has enjoyed mixed Monza results, winning in his 2007 championship year, but struggling with set-up problems to finish ninth in last season’s race. The ultra-fast Monza circuit has been revised for the 2010 season, with the Prima Variante chicane at the end of the start-finish straight now opened up slightly to avoid the bottleneck situations of previous years. The circuit length is consequently shortened by 16m to 5.777km. Kenan Sofuoglu Although I finished third and got some more points for the championship, I was very disappointed with the result at Assen. I had planned to go back to Turkey after the race but instead I stayed behind with the team to analyse the result and to try to find out what happened. The bike was probably set up too much to do fast lap times and might have been a bit too soft to battle hard with Laverty and Lascorz, who were very strong in the race. The base setting on the bike is very good though, and we will go to Monza to try to improve more and get back on top of the championship by winning again. Michele Pirro It was very disappointing for me to crash at Assen, especially after my team worked so hard to give me a good bike that I was able to put on the front row of the grid. They should have had a better reward at their home race. Kenan is showing with his results how good the CBR600RR is now and I know, after Portimao, that I am able to achieve good results with it, too. I am now even more determined to get back on the podium and it would be great to do it in Italy this weekend. Ronald ten Kate team manager Monza has historically produced good slipstream fighting in Superbikes, but I think we’ll see the same thing in Supersport this weekend with the leading three to five riders battling it out. For the moment, there are three riders who are clearly outstanding but I am quite sure that Michele Pirro wants to start mixing with them as soon as he can this weekend especially as this race is in Italy. More, from another press release issued by Hannspree Ten Kate Honda: Hannspree Ten Kate Honda riders, Jonathan Rea and Max Neukirchner, are preparing for round five of the 2010 World Superbike championship at Monza in Italy this weekend (7-9 May), looking to build on their performances in the last round at Assen. For Rea, Assen marked a perfect weekend with a full-house of pole position, two race wins and the fastest lap, elevating him to third in the championship standings; but the 23-year-old from Northern Ireland is certainly not resting on his hard-won laurels. Rea, who enjoyed two top five finishes at Monza in his rookie Superbike season last year, is eager to develop further the new base setting on his Honda CBR1000RR Fireblade. He and his crew plan on fine tuning it to suit the high-speed duels that the historic Monza circuit has traditionally thrown up in its first 20 years of World Superbikes. The revised 5.777km circuit, set in a royal park just north of Milan, holds particular memories for Rea’s team-mate, Max Neukirchner. The 27-year-old German took a win and a second place finish at Monza in 2008, but after qualifying on the front row last year was injured in a pile-up at the first chicane the Prima Variante. It is this corner that has now been opened up to prevent a bottleneck on the opening laps. Neukirchner ultimately missed the remainder of the 2009 season and good results thus far in 2010 have proved hard to find. However, after adapting both his bike and his riding style for the last round, he and his team were buoyed by impressive lap times and a season-best finish in race two at Assen. Jonathan Rea It’s been a really busy time since I got back from Assen I moved into a new apartment last weekend and then went to watch my motocross team and afterwards saw my brother in the British Superstock championship. I’m really looking forward to Monza, though, and the results last year were not so bad. We know the bike works there because Kiyo (Ryuichi Kiyonari) got on the podium twice, but I can’t wait to see how the new base setting transfers to Monza. It could have been easy to get carried away after the double win at Assen, but we’re not naïve enough to think that our rivals haven’t been working very hard since then. We certainly have, because we know how tough it is to get to the front and stay there. I’ll aim for another steady start this weekend; building momentum on Friday and Saturday. You need a bit of fight and determination at Monza, as well as a fast bike, and I’m planning on bringing both this weekend. Max Neukirchner I’m feeling very positive as we go to Monza because I really feel that we made a big step forward in the second race at Assen. We’ve changed the bike quite a bit and made it stiffer for race two, but the biggest change I&rsq uo;ve made is in my riding style. I need to brake differently into the corners to help me get out faster and, although Monza is known as a very fast circuit, I think we can still make some steps forward there on braking into the chicanes. It’s a very special place, but obviously I have some bad memories from last year. I will just be concentrating on improving the bike and my style and this, I think, will help me to close the book on last season’s problems. Ronald ten Kate team manager After the perfect weekend in Assen with Jonathan’s clean sweep we have to get our feet firmly back on the ground and get straight back to business at Monza. The Assen races were pretty close, but I believe that this weekend they may be even closer, so the smallest details will make all the difference. Max made a big step forward in race two at Assen and, although his new riding style feels slow to him, it definitely make s him go faster. I’m hoping he’ll make another step up towards the leading group at Monza, where the revised first corner will be new to everyone since no-one has tested there. But in theory, it’ll be better than the bus-stop chicane that was there before.