Whilst the 2023 MOTUL FIM Superbike World Championship is out for summer, stories are always breaking and if not, they’re being monitored closely. That’s the situation for Kawasaki Racing Team WorldSBK’s Guim Roda, who gave an overview of his team’s performance in 2023. What promised so much with a new engine homologation has turned out to be a rough ride; just one win – coming in the rain at Most – and not fighting for the title for the first time since Provec Racing took over the Kawasaki effort in 2012.
“NOBODY WINS FOREVER” – Roda lays it out bare
“2023 hasn’t gone as we expected,” began a direct Guim Roda, speaking at Most before the summer break commenced. “We came from a not easy 2021 and 2022 season. We were fighting for podiums, race wins and the title until the end, but unfortunately, this year, we could not start in a good mode. We’re trying to polish things with the tools we have and trying our best. Nobody wins forever; you need to accept to learn to lose and try your best. It’s important in racing and life, not just achieving success but fight for it and work for it. We’ll keep going; we have experience from the past to understand what to do to win and we’ll try again. That is our aim.”
“It’s obvious that there are no doubts on Jonny’s capacity to go fast; he demonstrated again in many conditions and we assembled the bike with the right tyres and he did the rest. We just need to continue, use the best opportunities and keep going. Alex is doing quite a good job and showing the bike’s potential in terms of speed; it’s not an easy bike to manage for a long race distance. Sometimes, we make a mistake with setup to gain something extra, instead we go back. He’s a big compliment for the team and he’s doing a good job.”
Both riders have had reasons to cheer in 2023; Rea took a masterful wet weather podium in the season-opening Phillip Island race, before he returned to the rostrum at Assen. His biggest achievement of the year was a 119th WorldSBK win, coming at Most in Race 1, when an intermediate tyre choice proved to be the right one, staying out on a drying track to win. As for Lowes, he got the team’s first dry podium of the year in the Tissot Superpole Race at Mandalika and has had nine top six finishes, albeit not since Donington Park.
“RACING IS RACING; CONTRACTS ARE THERE, BUT…” – 2024 on the horizon
Low points for the pair included uncharacteristic crashes for 36-year-old Rea during races. Mandalika’s Race 2, Assen’s Race 2 and Barcelona’s Superpole Race all caught Rea out, whilst for Lowes, a double crash in Race 1 and 2 in Australia, a Race 1 crash in Barcelona, Race 2’s fall at Misano and a tumble at Imola have been low points. Both riders are pushing to the limit and beyond. This has meant rumours regarding Rea’s future to start circulating, with Yamaha seemingly being an option despite having a contract with Kawasaki for 2024. Alex Lowes signed for 2024 ahead of his home round this year.
Responding to the question for the first time, Roda – an ex-racer himself and paddock stalwart – know that anything’s possible in racing: “You never know; at the end, racing is racing. Contracts are there, the motivation is there but anyway, we’ll need to see. We don’t have a plan B because plan A is Jonny, so we need to work on that and try our best.”
Finally, a test at Aragon will give Kawasaki the opportunity to make steps, although coy on what it will be: “It’s a middle of the year test, so it’s important as we’ll need to test many things during the year to confirm the direction of the past, whether we were right or not. At the same time, trying to make steps for the future to understand how we improve the package. It’s important and we’ll try to extract the maximum.”
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Source: WorldSBK.com