Michael van der Mark completed a stellar recovery in today’s 21-lap FIM Superbike World Championship race one at Circuit de Nevers Magny-Cours to take second place in spectacular fashion in front of the French crowd. After a promising start, his Honda WorldSBK team mate Nicky Hayden was forced into an early retirement at the end of lap 10 due to a technical problem.

The race got underway on a wet – but drying – track, with both Hayden and van der Mark able to get a great launch off sixth and seventh places on the grid. In the early laps, they ran as high as third and fourth, while swapping positions between themselves several times. After losing one place to Leon Camier, on lap six Hayden was the first rider to opt for a tyre change. After a couple of tentative laps, the American rider started to settle into a good rhythm and made up several places; unfortunately, by the end of the tenth lap he had to make his way back to the garage after suffering a technical problem, which put an end to a promising performance.

Van der Mark’s choice to pit at the end of lap 8 proved to be an excellent one: the 23-year-old from Rotterdam made perfect use of Pirelli’s slick tyres to storm past his rivals and, during the penultimate lap, he overtook Savadori for second place. He then managed to hold his position up to the chequered flag despite a resurgent Tom Sykes and crossed the line with a 0.347s margin over his rival.

Courtesy of his sixth podium finish of the season, van der Mark consolidates his fourth place in the championship standings.

Race two will take place tomorrow at 1pm local time (GMT +2) after the traditional 15-minute warm up scheduled at 9:25am.


Michael van der Mark - 60 - 2nd

What a crazy race! The track started to dry before the race started and that made the tyre choice a quite difficult one. I decided to stay on wet tyres after the sighting lap because I wasn’t sure if it was dry enough for intermediates. I had a good start and battled at the front in the first laps, but after that I couldn’t get up to speed on the straights and that was quite frustrating. I decided to calm down, wait one lap and then go back to the pits for a tyre change. It proved to be the right decision and especially at the right time. In the end Chaz was the one who got it perfect and congratulations to him for the win. I’m extremely happy with my second place; it’s nice to get back on the podium and to consolidate my fourth place in the standings.

Nicky Hayden - 69 - DNF

The race started out really well for us, especially compared to how I felt yesterday. We got the bike working much better in the wet than at the Lausitzring. I made a good start and was feeling quite good; then the sun came out exactly on the main straight and, at that point, I knew the track was going to dry very quickly. I opted for a little bit of a different strategy and pitted quickly; on the second lap after returning to the track I was already matching my previous lap times on wet tyres as I had a good feeling. Ultimately we had a problem, I started to lose power and by then I knew my race was over. For sure we wouldn’t have beaten Chaz Davies today: he made the perfect choice and his times on intermediate tyres were really impressive, but I think we had a really good shot at the podium. Too bad I also missed the chance for some laps in the dry; that was something I really needed.

Pieter Breddels - Technical Manager

It was quite a hectic race one. After qualifying in sixth and seventh positions, we decided to use wet tyres for both riders. It wasn’t an easy choice to make because the track was indeed wet, but we had no idea how fast it was going to dry. Nicky decided to make the tyre change quite early, but it was a good call by him. Unfortunately, he could not make the most of that brave call as the bike soon had a technical issue. Michael pitted two laps later and that proved to be an even better choice, because when he went back out he was 10 seconds ahead of Nicky, while before they were locked together. After that Michael simply rode a perfect race, although Tom Sykes caught him at the end. On one side, I’m really happy for Michael, as he really deserved the podium today. On the other hand, we’re sorry for what happened to Nicky. Hopefully tomorrow will be a good day for him, too.