What?
The recent 2024 World Superbike test at Portimao was no ordinary test. Along with the WSBK riders it was also infiltrated by the MotoGP Ducati riders riding Panigale V4s along with Valentino Rossi on a Yamaha R1 and Luca Marini on a crappy Fireblade or something.
Why?
The idea was to give the MotoGP riders a chance to sharpen up their reflexes as they swerved to avoid Bradley Smith out on track doing his best. However it also meant for the first time in ages fierce foes Rossi and Marquez would share a track again. Better still this was only a test, and not even a MotoGP one, so anything would go.
Who won?
Sadly we don’t know. This is because both Marquez brothers (the good, evil one and the not good, not evil one) rode without transponders so their times were unknown.
Why would they do that?
The official reasoning was so that the other Ducati riders, like Marco ‘had his one shot’ Bezzecchi didn’t get into a massive beef and start complaining if Marc was significantly faster.
But the swarms of dribbling Rossi fans claimed it was because the Marquez brothers were both scared of the world knowing how awful they both were. And cheats.
But was Rossi fast?
In this crowd no. He was in fact slowest.
Did Rossi manage to get the boot in on Marquez again?
Again sadly no. This would have been the perfect opportunity for the camp Italian to issue ‘Kicking 2.0’ with no retributions. We can only hope that this was planned and that Morbidelli’s crash, that ended day 2 early, denied the legendary Italian getting some revenge for 2015.
What about Morbidelli?
Although the exact details of the incident are unknown it appears Franco crashed heavily landing on his head – which can often be the preferred outcome for riders like Jack Miller. However the Italian suffered enough injuries to keep him in hospital for a few days and bring a premature end to the test….something the WSBK riders must have really appreciated.
When it comes to getting injured at critical times then poor Franky knows a thing or two. In 2023 the hapless Italian managed to injure his knee whilst worshiping the gold Rossi statue at Rossi’s Neverland ranch just when Yamaha offered him a factory bike.
This latest injury could see Morbidelli miss pre-season testing and deny him experience on the Ducati that could be pivotal to the Italian looking less embarrassing compared to Marquez’s pace on his second-hand budget-friendly Ducati.
OMG! World Superbike? Is that still a thing?
Believe it or not WSBK is still going. Despite never been watched since the late 90s WSBK is proving to be a great championship for failed GP riders to compete in as an introduction to retirement.
So what happened in the WSBK test?
One of the biggest talking points was Nicolo Bulega’s performance on the factory Ducati.
Who’s he?
Exactly. Bulega finished a dreary 26th in the 2021 Moto2 championship before moving to World Supersport in 2022.
However the Italian took the WSS championship last year on a Ducati and was promoted to the factory Ducati World Superbike team for this season. Despite being a rookie Nicolo, who technically has a girl’s name, has been topping the timesheets in the pre-season tests. This impressive feat massively reduces Alvaro Bautista’s theory that it was him that made all the difference last season and not the bike.
Where was boyband Bautista?
Poor Alvaro’s has been suffering from the World Superbike’s new ‘anti Bautista’ ruling that sees all malnutritional riders that weigh less than 30kg penalised with extra ballast. This new rule, that stops feather-light riders having a massive speed advantage, has predictably caused Bautista to struggle massively. Which is a bit funny.