Team Pedercini rider Leandro “Tati” Mercado will not take part to the 2012 Superbike World Championship first round of Phillip Island. The 19 years old rider sustained a fracture of the right radius after a crash on his supermoto bike during a training session last week in Argentina. As a consequence of this Mercado will miss out on the Australian Round. On Monday Tati underwent a surgical operation to speed up his rehabilitation. He will be back for the second round at Imola, Italy, that will take place on April 1st. Aussie Bryan Staring in Phillip Island will replace him. Bryan already participated last year with the Italian Team – as a wild card – in the first round of the World Superbike at Phillip Island, finishing with a fifteenth and a seventeenth place in the two races. Leandro “Tati” Mercado: “I’m really disappointed because I won’t be able to participate at the Phillip Island races as it could be my Superbike debut. I was eager to compete in Australia hoping to obtain good results. I know the whole team worked extremely hard to prepare my bike for the first appointment of the season and now I’m forced to miss out on the race. Starting from next week, with the help of my doctors, I’ll start intensive rehabilitation to make sure that I’ll be in top condition for the second race in Imola”.