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The official race report service of Kawasaki Racing Team.

18 september 2017

Razgatlioglu And Carrasco Take Stunning Race Wins

Toprak Razgatlioglu (Kawasaki Puccetti Racing) rode to an almost start-to-finish STK1000 race win on Sunday 17th September. Hitting the front on lap two the Ninja ZX-10RR rider eased away from his competitors in fine style to win a shortened nine-lap race by almost 2.5 seconds.

The Portimao WorldSTK race had been scheduled for 14 laps, but was eventually run over only nine after a machine behind Razgatlioglu started to blow blue smoke and the race was red-flagged as a precaution.
 
Out front on his own, Razgatlioglu earned full points for his third win of the year and he moved to within eight points of the championship lead with two rounds to go, in Magny Cours and Jerez.
 
Jeremy Guarnoni (Pedercini Racing Kawasaki) was fifth in the Portimao STK1000 race, 5.667 seconds from Razgatlioglu. Toni Finsterbusch (Agro-On Benjan Kawasaki) was tenth in the Portuguese contest and his team-mate Wayne Tessels scored 15th place, for a single championship point.
 
Toprak Razgatlioglu stated, “I am really happy to win again and take full points. This week there was so much work for team to do but they made a good job, so great thanks to them. The championship situation is now a lot better and all I can say is thank you to everyone involved.”
 
Nothing less than motorsports history was made in the WorldSSP300 race at Portimao when Ana Carrasco (ETG Racing Kawasaki) became the first woman to win a full FIM World Championship race.
 
Her late attack on the final corner had come after a tough race spent in a fight at the front with several other rivals. Using clever tactics to back up her race-long demonstration of skill and tenacity Carrasco won by 0.053 seconds, with the top four riders covered by just 0.167 seconds over the line. Carrasco’s win puts her seventh in the championship.
 
The successes of Razgatlioglu and Carrasco, when added to a double WorldSBK win for KRT’s Jonathan Rea and a victory for Kenan Sofuoglu (Kawasaki Puccetti Racing) in WorldSSP, ensured at Kawasaki riders won every single race at Portimao.
 
Recent championship leader Scott Deroue (MTM HS Kawasaki) is still third in the WorldSSP300 title fight, after finishing seventh in the 11-lap Portimao event. With two rounds left he is 18 points from the lead and has all to play for during the final rounds in France and Spain.
 
Ana Carrasco, stated: “I have been working really hard all year to find this result and it is really important for the history as it was the first time for a woman to win a race in an FIM tarmac based championship  - so this is good for all the people. I think it will be a change of mentality and people will think that a woman can be fighting for the championship. It was a perfect day for Kawasaki.”
 
Scott Deroue: “I'm really disappointed about the result, especially because of the good pace in practices and I was feeling at home on this track. Taking P7 isn't doing me a great favour in the championship standings. Although I'm still in third place the gap to the leader extended. But, the game is still on. I will fight till the end and you never know how it will unfold.”
 
The penultimate round for both STK1000 and WorldSSP300 riders takes place at Magny Cours, with raceday on Sunday October 1.