MUGELLO 21-25 MARCH

YAKHNICH MOTORSPORT

CIV 2012 

First stage

MUGELLO 21-25 MARCH 

It was not so easy, it was even hard in some moments, but the first CIV 2012  week-end at least gave to Yakhnich Team good results, good informations and good feelings for the rest of the season. 

It was not so easy especially for our Supersport riders, Vladimir Leonov and Sergey Vlasov. Vladimir had a good thursday, discovering in few laps that all was ok with his bike (he did an easy 1’56”3 in just one lap) and a very good friday morning free practice session, in which he ended in second position with a 1’55”7 time.  But unfortunately in his first qualifying, one of the sensors of  his bike quit working, and he couldn’t do real laps in all session.

On saturday morning, he again got into a good rithm (second absolute) in free practice, with a 1’55”4, but he was unlucky in second qualifying when it started raining, so it wasn’t possible to do good laptimes, and he was obliged in the race to start from 23rd position.

Sergey Vlasov was using in Mugello for the first time the Supersport bike, so on Thursday for him it was a hard working day having to learn the thousand things needed to know how to use the Marelli electronic management system... and, unfortunately he crashed in the last session, destroying the bike against the barrier. No problems for the rider, but bike suffered a lot. It wasn’t possibile to fix it for the race. So, during the night mechanichs prepared him the Stock bike, and he was obliged to ride friday, saturday and sunday with this stock bike, making his mind go backwards with a complete different way to ride.

It was not an easy thing to do, that’s why the  team is honored to say thank you to him for the effort he made. Sergey knew he could’t be protagonist of the race, but was riding in qualyfing with the same concentration as he would with the best bike out there. 

So Sunday race arrived with the two Yakhnich riders in the last row of the starting grid. No problem for Leonov, because we decided to use this race to test some particular setting for the next race WSS in Imola. 

In any case all people at Mugello will remember Leonov’s race as the most emotional race of this whole weekend. From last row, lap by lap, overtaking after overtaking, he was able in a few laps to pass from 23.th position to fourth position, which was just few seconds away from the podium riders!

Last victim of his race was Alessandro Gramigni, known as king of Mugello, on the factory R6 used by Yamaha Europe as a development bike! 

Yes,  a standing ovation was waiting for him at the box, even if in the last two laps he lost the fourth position and arrived sixth. 

“I had some chattering from the beginning, so I couldn’t push really hard — he declared after finishing the race —“

He had chattering in the front, while he was riding with the same pace as the first three riders, and he couldn’t really push to his 100%... and this could help him a lot to understand what he could do next week in WSS at Imola!

Vlasov finished his really hard weekend seeing the checkered flag in 17th place. And it was a great result, and waiting for him are more lucky weekends.

The other great result of the day was the fifth place of Dakota Mamola in the stock 600 race.

Mamola was the only rider of the team not having any problem during week-end. He worked hard, first to learn the track as he’s never seen the circuit, then to learn how how to go fast and furious around it and getting an idea of all the stock 600 riders. 

His practice sessions were better and better, the bike set-up increased his performances day by day, allowing him an astonishing time of 1’57”6 in qualifying. 

He started in the race from 14th position, and, following the suggestion of the team and his father Randy Mamola, he was 11th position for the first laps, what was important was not to push so hard to preserve the tyres, which loose their performances quickly in this Mugello track weekend. From the fourth lap, he started an incredible race, overtaking many riders, always riding on the rithm of 1’57”, while all riders ahead of him started soon to sign worst and worst laps, because of tyre consumptions. 

He was fifth, at the end, with an incredible overtaking around the outside going into first corner in the last lap, with all the spectators clapping this fantastico son of a fantastic mith of two wheel racing hystory Randy Mamola. 

Yes, Yakhnich team 2012 will be protagonist not only in Supersport, but even in stock 600!

The fourt rider of the team David Leonov, honoured his first international race with a 34th position in the first yamaha R6 stage. Even David increased his rithm day by day, and during the race, instead of big problems with his knee, which gave him lot of pain, was able to ride all the race in the rithm of 2’08”, that is a great result for such a young beginner in one of the most difficult track in the world.

Thank’s David for your enthusiasm and your mental strenght that allow you to ride in the “wild” group” of the yamaha R6 Trophy!

We are sure to see you improve and go faster and faster race by race!

 

Next race week-end for Yakhnich Team is in Imola, next sunday, with the second stage of WSS with Vladimir Leonov.