Sandy track does not give room for improvements
The penultimate round of the FIM MOTUL Superbike world championship started off today with the first free practice on the San Juan Villicum Circuit in Argentina under difficult circumstances. Already when Markus Reiterberger walked the track with his team yesterday, he could notice that the conditions of the track were far from ideal and he knew that it would not be easy to steer the BMW S 1000 RR safe on this sandy surface of the almost 4.3 km long racetrack. Despite the efforts of the promoter and organizers of the event to clean the track, the wind blew the sand back onto the tarmac, which did not allow safe turning of the bike, neither for Markus Reiterberger, nor for the rest of the WorldSBK field.
But the 25-years-old was not only fighting with the conditions of the track today. Also the set up of his BMW S 1000 RR caused Reiti discomfort. The set up work will continue tomorrow during the third and last free practice before the Superpole session will decide about the starting positions and before it goes into race one in the afternoon.
Markus Reiterberger, #28 - P17: „The surface of the track in Argentina is really dirty. There is a lot of sand on the track. The organizers really tried to clean it, but they were not very successful with it. The wind blows the sand back all the time. I think also the other riders were quite surprised. There is a similar lack of grip on this track like when it is raining. You can compare it with Magny-Cours and that were exactly the conditions, that are not in my interest. I tried to get to grips with the track during the first free practice. During the second free practice we worked on the settings of the chassis and we worked through our test-program as well. Then I made some small mistakes and I had my difficulties to handle the bike. We tried a lot, that was supposed to help me, but until now I was not able to build a good feeling with the bike. We had a look at the data now and I really hope that I will be able to set up the bike together with my crew chief to meet my needs tomorrow.“