Winter Testing

It's been five months since the excitement of the last race of 2005 at Brands Hatch when Leon clinched his first British Supersport championship. While everyone in the team takes the opportunity for a bit of R&R, the New Year sees things getting busy again on the race track instead of just behind the scenes.

The riders are always keen to get back onto the bikes, so a few days of shakedown sessions were arranged at Cadwell Park and Almeria in Southern Spain . But it wasn't until mid February that Cal and Leon got their first real taste of the 2006 bikes at the full test session at Guadix. The team worked extensively with Pirelli testing different tyre options along with brake pads, front discs and fuel mapping for optimum power delivery to gain a good basic setup for the bike in preparation for the start of the season. Despite some changeable and sometimes inclement weather conditions the team got off to a strong start.

Cal building on his strong performances at the back end of 2005 dialled in the setup pretty quickly and wasted no time in posting a new Supersport lap record of 1:18.66 at the Spanish track. Meanwhile Leon settled in well with his transition to both Pirelli tyres and Ohlins suspension which provide a very different riding experience from what he had been used to. By the end of the 3 day test Cal had set a best time during long race runs of 1:18.39, with Leon hot on his heels with a 1:18.42.

While everyone is naturally keen to set headline grabbing times in testing and put the wind up the competition, the major emphasis is on learning about the bike and the rider preferences in order to get a strong base setup to the new season. As a result it appears that Pirelli have made tremendous steps forward over the winter, with extensive development work filtering down from World SBK programme. With testing continuing back in the UK at Mallory and Snetterton as we go to press the whole team is focussed on getting everything in the best possible shape for a highly competitive start to what is sure to be a closely fought championship.