Champion Orellana signs off with victory at Magny-Cours

Javier Orellana backed up last weekend’s European Junior Cup championship victory at Jerez in Spain with a thrilling victory in today’s final round at the French circuit of Magny-Cours. He was joined on the podium by two French riders Dorian Laville and Guillaume Raymond.

In a fantastic race with constant changes of leader and battles throughout the field, Orellana displayed the class that has taken him to five race victories in this season’s European Junior Cup which is contested on identically-prepared Honda CBR650F machines.

The 18-year-old Spaniard experienced several problems in preparation for today’s 10-lap race at the 4.411km Magny-Cours circuit and could qualify no higher than fifth but he used his four years of EJC experience to battle his two French rivals both of whom had started on the front row, with Raymond in pole position.

Also starting on the front row was Emanuele Pusceddu who ran off track whilst leading the closing stages after tangling with fellow Italian Alfonso Coppola. Pusceddu eventually finished just off the podium in fourth with promising youngster Paolo Grassia fifth and securing second place overall in the standings.

New Zealand’s Avalon Biddle followed up her own victory in the inaugural Women’s European Championship at Jerez last time out by taking her sixth win of the year to emphasise her own domination of the women’s series.

Javier Orellana

It was a perfect race after the disaster of Friday and Saturday. I crashed on lap three of free practice and then I had a problem with the disk brake and couldn’t do any laps. We had the rain on Saturday for qualifying when I had to push and then the race today was a big battle. We had a group along the big straight and I was fighting Pusceddu really hard. But it’s been a great season for me with five victories out of eight, two other podiums and one zero. I want to say thank you to Gerry Bryce [series director], I’ve had four great years in this series and I have learned so much. I hope to be with him for some more years to come.

Gerry Bryce – series director

It was a fantastic race to end the season here at Magny-Cours and we were so lucky with the weather. I think it was probably the best race of the season – there were so many lead changes, so much action right through the field and, in the end, Javi just showed his class again. It wasn’t an easy win by any means but I think he’s been a fantastic champion all year. Paolo Grassia, who finished second overall, is only fifteen and is definitely one to watch next year when he could be a contender. And Guillaume Raymond, who was also on the podium, has been fast all weekend. Needless to say, Avalon Biddle won the Women’s championship race again and underlined her dominance. It’s been a great inaugural Women’s European Championship and I hope it inspires more female racers to come forward and sign up for the first race of 2016 at Aragon!

2015 Pata European Junior Cup, powered by Honda

Round eight, Magny-Cours, France – Sunday, 4 October

Results:

1 J Orellana (ESP)

2 D Laville (FRA)

3 G Raymond (FRA)

4 E Pusceddu (ITA)

5 P Grassia (ITA)

6 M Perez (ESP)

7 S Hill (GBR)

8 H Cabuk (TUR)

9 M Ciprietti (ITA)

10 S Wilford (GBR)

EJC standings after final round:

1 Orellana 157, 2 Grassia 101, 3 Raymond 98, 4 Pusceddu 90, 5 Laville 79, 6 de Gruttola 60, 7 Soomer 59, 8 Wilford 58, 9 Coppola 57, 10 Cabuk 46

FIM Europe Women’s European Championship standings after final round:

1 Avalon Biddle (NZL) 166, 2 Anastassia Kovalenko (EST) 112, 3 Laura Rodrigues (SUI) 105, 4 Viktoria Kis (HUN) 86, 5 Charlie Oakland (GBR) 20