Kawasaki Riders Lead 2016 ASC After First Round
Kawasaki supported riders have set the pace by winning both the Superbike and Supersport classes at round one of the 2016 Australasian Superbike Championship held at Sydney Motorsport Park over the weekend.
Matt Walters rocketed aboard his Kawasaki Connection Ninja ZX-10R to win the first race by a massive 3.96 seconds. Matt carried through to win the second race and finished the final race in a close second place. The 2013 ASC champion’s terrific performance granted him 1st place overall for the round.
“Our Ninja ZX-10R is getting better and better. Conditions weren’t the best today, the track was really hot but we made some adjustments to accommodate for that and it certainly worked. The development of the bike has come along leaps and bounds and it’s only getting stronger and stronger every time we ride it,” Matt commented.
Ben Burke of Kawasaki supported team SA Kawasaki BCperformance affirmed his rapport with the 2016 Ninja ZX-10R by securing a win in the 3rd Superbike race and placing 3rd overall for the round.
“I’m getting on with this bike a lot better than I did with the 2015 Ninja ZX-10R. It felt like the last one was a bit big for me and I couldn’t muscle it around but with the 2016 Ninja ZX-10R, I’m able to put it onto the track where I want to and I can actually push it to my limit,” said Burk.
Team mate, Robbie Bugden, wasn’t far behind in each race aboard his SA Kawasaki BCperformance Ninja ZX-10R with a promising 4th place overall.
“I made it hard for myself with the start in each race but I showed that I have the pace once we get into the laps. We just need to get through those first few laps a little bit quicker and we are working towards achieving that,” said the 32 year old veteran motorcycle racer.
SA Kawasaki BCperformance’s Supersport effort paid dividends in the form of Kyle Buckley’s 1st place overall aboard his Ninja ZX-6R. Buckley dominated in every race except race 4 where he came second.
“I think we have the Ninja ZX-6R sorted. We are starting to iron out a few things now that we are running slicks with the series this year. We have a lot more traction in the rear now which effects everything else so we are coming to grips with all of that now and we are playing catch-up with the bikes settings in the races which is fun,” said the modest 21 year old.
Supersport team mate, Ryan Masri, showed promising results in his ASC Supersport debut. 6th place overall out of the field of 15 riders was a strong result after stepping up from the Kawasaki Insurances FX300 Ninja Cup to his Ninja ZX-6R in the Supersport class this year.
Kawasaki supported riders will be looking to maintain their leads at round 2 of the Australasian Superbike Championship held at Mallala Motorsport Park in South Australia on May 27th.
2016 Australasian Superbike Championship, Round 1 Superbike overall results:
Rnd 1
1 Matthew WALTERS (NSW) 1 25 25 22 73
2 Michael BLAIR (NSW) 0 20 22 20 62
3 Ben BURKE (NSW) 0 18 18 25 61
4 Robbie BUGDEN (QLD) 0 22 20 18 60
5 Paul BYRNE (IRE) 0 16 16 16 48
6 Beau BEATON (NSW) 0 12 15 15 42
7 Mathew HARDING (NSW) 0 15 13 13 41
8 Brendan McINTYRE (NSW) 0 14 12 11 37
9 Liam WILKINSON (SA) 0 13 11 12 36
10 Jason IVKOVIC (SA) 0 11 9 10 30
11 Brad SWALLOW (NSW) 0 0 14 14 28
12 Evan BYLES (SA) 0 0 10 0 10
2016 Australasian Superbike Championship, Round 1 Superport overall results:
Rnd 1
1 Kyle BUCKLEY (NSW) 1 25 25 25 22 98
2 Mitch LEVY (NSW) 0 22 22 22 20 86
3 Cambridge OLIVIER (NSW) 0 20 20 20 18 78
4 Mark CHIODO (VIC) 0 18 16 18 25 77
5 Jordan CARLSSON (NSW) 0 16 15 16 14 61
6 Ryan MASRI (NSW) 0 15 14 13 15 57
7 Hayden SPINKS (NSW) 0 14 13 14 13 54
8 Gregory THEARLE (NSW) 0 11 10 11 12 44
9 Bernie RUSSELL (NSW) 0 10 9 10 10 39
10 Warren GIBB (NT) 0 0 11 12 11 34
11 Matthew SHIPP (NSW) 0 13 12 9 0 34
12 Benjamin LOUQHNAN (NSW) 0 9 8 8 8 33
13 Samuel MULDOON (NSW) 0 0 0 15 16 31
14 Keith FEELY (QLD) 0 8 7 7 9 31
15 Michael KNIGHT (NSW) 0 12 18 0 0 30
Photo credit – Murray Sayle
