Expectations are high ahead of the final meet in the SA Superbike Championship to be held at AA Kyalami this weekend where the current-regulation 600cc motorcycles will race for the last time before replacement.
Expectations are high ahead of the final meet in the SA Superbike Championship to be held at AA Kyalami this weekend where the current-regulation 600cc motorcycles will race for the last time before replacement.
Next season, near-standard superbikes with unlimited capacity will replace the current bikes. Of the 25 starters, at least seven are in for the shot at the top podium step.
Ahead of the final at AA Kyalami, Autopage Cellular Yamaha’s Russell Wood has already been crowned South African Superbike Champion for the year. And while he may already have bagged the main prize, he still has to win on Saturday, if only just to maintain his five-year record of winning both the seasons’ first and last races.
Wood, the Cellular Yamaha team captain has an unassailable points lead in this season’s championship, following his 11 victories from 18 starts this year.
“I shall be able to relax, forget about Championship strategies and simply race to win,” said the 14-times national titleholder.
“My team mate Greg Dreyer is also back on the winning pace, and we shall be looking at finishing first and second, to round out an excellent season,” Wood added.
Meanwhile, Shaun Whyte (First Technology Yamaha) and Hudson Kennaugh (Cell C Suzuki) will continue to do battle for the Championship’s runner-up spot.
To do so, they will have to beat off fierce competition, led by Cell C
Suzuki’s Trevor Crookes and Stewart MacLeod, First Technology Yamaha’s
Arushen Moodley and multiple former Champion and Autopage Cellular Yamaha’s Greg Dreyer.
Other competitors who could upset the front order include Inala
Kawasaki racers Greame van Breda and Garth Norris, Cell C Suzuki’s Noel
Haarhoff and Alex Lenearts on his First Technology Yamaha.
Sheridan Morias (Teazers Kawasaki) and Gavin Ramsay on his Kreepy Krauly Yamaha will be fighting it out for the season’s Privateers’ Challenge title. They are expected to be strongly challenged by Suzuki’s Robert Cragg, Charles Grassie (Autopage Cellular Yamaha) and the Mad Buzz Ducati’s of Clinton Pienaar and Robert Portman.
Saturday morning will see the Superbikes taking to the circuit for official qualifying and an eight-lap race, with a ten-lap race to follow in the afternoon.
