Kawasaki

Sunday's World Supersport race at Silverstone was marred by an ugly crash shortly after the start. Eugene Laverty accidentally clipped the rear wheel of Joan Lascorz' Motocard Kawasaki, and the Spaniard went down. Lascorz was then hit full on by wildcard rider Roberto Tamburini on the Bike Service Yamaha, in turn throwing Tamburini off his bike and sending him tumbling through the grass at the side of the track, and hitting the unprotected wall just a few feet from the edge of the track. Both Tamburini and Lascorz were removed from the track by ambulance for examination at the Clinica Mobile, where early reports suggested that both men had come away virtually unscathed, with Tamburini reported as having a dislocated shoulder.

The World Supersport race at Silverstone was red-flagged before the first lap had been completed, after a nasty incident in Copse corner. Motocard Kawasaki's Joan Lascorz, who had taken the lead off the line, had his rear wheel clipped as he cut inside by Parkalgar Honda's Eugene Laverty. Lascorz fell, and was hit by Roberto Tamburini's Bike Service RT Yamaha R6 in the back. That impact also launched Tamburini off his bike, tumbling nastily through the grass.

Both Tamburini and Lascorz were removed from the track by ambulance, Lascorz apparently sitting up in the ambulance. Both men were transported to the Clinica Mobile, where they are currently being examined.

Both men have been ruled out of the race, which is due to be restarted in the next few minutes. The crash will have a big impact on Lascorz' title chances: the Spaniard was 15 points behind leader Kenan Sofuoglu in the championship standings, and 7 points ahead of Eugene Laverty in 3rd place.

UPDATE:
Reports from Silverstone indicate that both Lascorz and Tamburini are relatively OK. Lascorz is beaten up and bruised, with bruising to his chest and a concussion, while Tamburini has a dislocated shoulder, and bruising to his lower back. 

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PBM Kawasaki's Chris Vermeulen has released another chapter in his personal video reports from the racing. In Saturday's episode, Vermeulen talks about how his leg is healing, how Superpole went and what happened during his very nasty looking crash.

After this weekend's double-header of races, with both World Superbikes in Valencia and MotoGP in Qatar, OnTheThrottleTV put on their usual excellent live video show, featuring interviews and news. The interview subject for the World Superbike series was Roger Lee Hayden, who talks to Dave Williams about the Valencia weekend and living in Ben Spies mountain hideaway in Como, Italy. Here's what Hayden had to say:

Chris Vermeulen's crash at his home World Superbike round at Phillip Island is having more serious consequences than he at first thought. The PBM Kawasaki rider badly damaged his knee in the incident, and has faced a long road to recovery ever since. Vermeulen's plans to make a return at Portimao were thwarted after just one lap, after the Australian tried to ride, but found he couldn't put any weight on the pegs. He pulled back into the pits after one lap and pulled out.

With just two weeks between Portimao and Valencia, the Australian had hoped to return to racing in Spain, but after consulting with doctors recommended by former Motocross World Champions Joel Smets and Stefan Everts, Vermeulen has been forced to pull out of Valencia as well. In a video posted on his Youtube channel, Vermeulen explained that the arthroscopic surgery Vermeulen had performed turned up a lot more damage than had been previously spotted, ruling out any chance of racing at Valencia. So serious is the damage that it is likely to require major surgery to repair fully, which Vermeulen hopes to put off until he finishes racing. But the Australian still has high hopes that the damage will repair itself naturally.

Although the loss of the live video feed from the World Superbike website is greatly lamented, Infront Motor Sports has some small consolation. On the World Superbike Youtube channel, IMS have put up highlight reels from this weekend's racing, showing the best of the action from both World Superbike races and the World Supersport races at Portimao. What better way to start the week than with a quick recap of the races?

World Superbike Race 1 highlights:

World Superbike Race 2 highlights:

With four weeks between the Phillip Island and Portimao rounds of World Superbikes, Kawasaki's Chris Vermeulen had hoped to have sufficient time to recover from the horrific knee injury he suffered in a crash. Sadly for the Australian, that has not proved to be the case, and after taking a lap of the demanding Portuguese circuit, Vermeulen decided to pull out of the event. Here he is, explaining the decision in a video posted on his Youtube channel yesterday:

Ask most motorcycle racing fans to name a World Supersport team, and the names you are most likely to hear are the Ten Kate Honda team of Ronald and Gerrit ten Kate and Simon Buckmaster's Parkalgar Honda team. But Kenan Sofuoglu and Eugene Laverty have got had their hands full over the past season holding off the Spanish Motocard Kawasaki rider Joan Lascorz, and this year Lascorz looks even stronger than ever.

To highlight this fact, Kawasaki released a promotional video presenting Lascorz and his team, Team Kawasaki Provec Motocard.com, to give them their full title. Though the video contains little information, it does show the process that goes into preparing a race-winning World Supersport machine. It remains a fascinating insight to just how close these machines are to standard production road bikes, that you can walk  in off the street and buy, if you are so inclined.

Despite it being nearly four weeks since the World Superbike paddock last convened at Phillip Island, the weekend - and the runup to that weekend - is having knock on effects on the rider lineup of the series. Before the weekend had even started, Australian rider Broc Parkes broke a tibia during training, and was replaced on the Echo CRS Honda by fellow Australian Josh Brookes. Parkes is still not fully fit to race, and so will be replaced by South African Sheridan Morais at Portimao.

Morais was a substitute rider last year, taking the place of Makoto Tamada in Paul Bird's Kawasaki World Superbike squad. The South African has switched manufacturers this winter, and is currently campaigning an Aprilia RSV4 in the South African Superbike series.