After taking an extraordinary victory in Race 1, the Aruba.it Racing – Ducati team stepped back on the podium in Race 2 at Laguna Seca (U.S.A.) with Chaz Davies. Starting from ninth position on the grid, the Welshman fought hard in the early laps to make his way through traffic and take third position. Davies then mounted a comeback on Sykes, progressively reducing the gap up to one second before being cut short by the checkered flag.
Marco Melandri, after showing significant progress during WUP in the morning, couldn’t make the most of a start from pole position, losing positions in the early phases of the race due to grip issues. Climbing back up from ninth position after briefly running off track, the Italian showed his grit to secure another fourth place finish.
After eight rounds, Davies (226 points) and Melandri (189 points) are respectively third and fourth in the championship. WorldSBK will now take a break ahead of the ninth round, scheduled for August 18-20 at EuroSpeedway Lausitz (Germany). The Aruba.it Racing – Ducati team will prepare the round with a two-day test on the German track on July 25-26.
Chaz Davies (Aruba.it Racing – Ducati #7) – 3rd
“It was a mostly lonely but still difficult race. Our start wasn’t bad, but our rivals’ was better. It will be something to work on during the summer break. The bike was making a lot of noise today, so we’ll look into that, but I’m not sure it affected our performance. Our rivals rode a great race nonetheless. I was struggling with grip on the first touch of gas, at high lean angles. I tried my best to take second place, but we would have needed more laps. Now we’ll take a break, which will be important to resume training and get back to 100 percent, even though my physical conditions were decent here. Then, we’ll go test at Lausitzring, which will be very important for the second part of the season.”
Marco Melandri (Aruba.it Racing – Ducati #33) – 4th
“For sure we expected a better result after practice. Yesterday’s race was a bit strange, while after WUP today we thought we found the right direction to take at least the podium, but once again we struggled during the race. It seems that our base setup is really competitive but doesn’t work as well in hot conditions, where we struggle with grip. We need to understand why. Anyway, it’s been a positive first half of the season. I gradually adjusted to the bike and I feel progressively more comfortable. Of course we wanted to do better here after winning at Misano. The tests at Lausitzring will be very useful. We’ll get better, my team is working really hard and I’m optimistic for the future.”
Ernesto Marinelli, Superbike Project Director
“Today’s race was a bit complicated. We didn’t get off to a strong start, even though our pace improved compared with yesterday. Chaz tried hard to take second place, scoring another important podium. Marco had bigger issues with grip, but still managed to collect valuable points. We’ll work hard as always to be better prepared for the second part of the season.”
