Vierge and Lecuona seek confirmation at Donington Park
Team HRC riders Iker Lecuona and Xavi Vierge are now at Donington Park in the UK, with high hopes for the upcoming fifth round of the 2024 Superbike World Championship.
In recent weeks, the team has completed both the fourth WorldSBK championship round at Misano and a series of tests, at both the Cremona Circuit and the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya. With Lecuona having scored encouraging results during round 4, and with the squad having made some progress during testing, one of the main goals for both riders this weekend is to confirm the validity of its recent work and translate this into race results.
The 2023 race weekend at Donington failed to live up to expectations for Team HRC, when a variety of factors including unstable weather, a crash and a red flag impacted on the outright race results. As the squad continues with its step-by-step approach to turning recent fortunes around, Vierge and Lecuona are keen to put what they have learned into practice, starting at the British round.
The very first WorldSBK race was held at the Donington Park circuit in Leicestershire, England, back in 1988 and the track has been a regular fixture on the calendar ever since. The oldest British track still in operation today, it currently measuring 4.023 km with a 550 m start/finish straight, seven right-hand turns and five left-handers. The track was resurfaced ahead of the 2023 WorldSBK round.
Weekend schedule (CEST -1):
Friday
10.20 – 11.05 Free Practice 1
15.00 – 15.45 Free Practice 2
Saturday
9.00 – 9.20 Free Practice 3
11.00 – 11.15 Superpole
14.00 Race 1
Sunday
9.00 – 9.10 Warm-up
11.00 Superpole race
14.00 Race 2
Xavi Vierge 97
Donington is an incredible track, and I look forward to racing there again. It's true that we’ve never had the best results, but if anything, that gives me even more motivation to do well this year. We’ve just completed a few test sessions where we were able to try many items and where the team did an amazing job to identify the best base setup. So, let’s see how we start the weekend, and hopefully we’ll be able to start closing the gap to the guys ahead.
Iker Lecuona 7
Donington is both a very special track that I like, but also a very tricky one for us. Together with Most and Magny-Cours, it is one of the tracks where we’ve really struggled in the past, either due to the grip, the changes of direction, the stopping, or the shifting. But I think we’ve done a good job lately, so now we have a chance to see to what extent we’ve actually improved and really assess our level. We’ll see if the weather gives us time to work on the bike setup but, if we are able to confirm the improvement at Donington, it means we are heading in the right direction.
Location Information
Donington Park Circuit Castle Donington, Derby, DE74 2RP, United Kingdom Donington Park
| POLE POSITION | LEFT |
| LENGHT | 4.023 Km |
| CORNERS | 12 |
| RIGHT CORNERS | 7 |
| LEFT CORNERS | 5 |
Records
| Pole Record | 1'24.629 (171,133 Km/h) T. Razgatlioglu (BMW M 1000 RR, 2024) |
| Race Record | 1'25.597 (169,198 Km/h) T. Razgatlioglu (BMW M 1000 RR, RC2, 2024) |
| All Time Record | 1'24.629 (171,133 Km/h) T. Razgatlioglu (BMW M 1000 RR, 2024) |
| 2024 Race 1 Winner | T. Razgatlioglu (BMW M 1000 RR) |
| 2024 Superpole Race Winner | T. Razgatlioglu (BMW M 1000 RR) |
| 2024 Race 2 Winner | T. Razgatlioglu (BMW M 1000 RR) |
