Attack The World! Gagne In The WorldSBK Points At Portimao
By Michael Gougis
In the end, it was hot, hard work, but the reward for Attack Racing’s foray into WSBK competition was a WorldSBK point for its 15th-place finish in Race Two.
It’s hard to overstate how complicated showing up for a single race weekend in a new series actually is. For example, the team had to try all of the available tires, rather than relying on their notes from the previous visit to the Algarve circuit to simplify their evaluation of the available Pirelli rubber.
With the number of tires limited by WorldSBK regulations, and with practice time limited, the team decided to test all of the available compounds as early as possible during the weekend. This meant that their supply of tires was limited, and they made the strategic decision to simply use Sunday morning’s warm up session to test suspension settings on worn rubber and not go for a time.
Things got better in the Superpole Race. Rider Jake Gagne’s best lap was just a tick over 1.4 seconds slower then race winner Toprak Razgatlioglu’s fastest time. Gagne notched a 16th, just behind extremely experienced World Superbike racer Eugene Laverty.
Race Two started out challenging, with Gagne stuck in the all-too-typical mid-pack World Superbike first-corner scrum. Once Gagne found his rhythm and a bit of clear track, he was able to start to put all of the team’s knowledge from the weekend and his experience from his track time to use.
