WSBK: Five things to take away from the 2021 Estoril Round

It was only Round 2 of the 2021 WorldSBK championship season, but the races at Estoril could prove crucial in the title fight.

Jonathan Rea (Kawasaki Racing Team WorldSBK) did what he does best and extended his championship lead while his rivals showed signs of nerves setting in.

From the highs of winning to the depths of despair, tyres playing their part in proceedings, and impressive newcomers, a rollercoaster weekend in Portugal had a bit of everything.

The Johnny Rea idiot’s guide to winning championships

… don’t make mistakes when your opponents do.

Rea doesn’t have weak tracks, but, on paper, Estoril falls into the weaker category. When the paddock stopped there last season, the world champion finished off the podium in all runs and struggled to even take points in Race 2.

Going into the Round this year, his title rivals had a cross on the weekend as a golden chance to gain an advantage – but proceedings would take a different turn.

Toprak Razgatlioglu (Pata Yamaha with BRIXX WorldSBK), twice a winner at Estoril last season, fought Rea off in Race 1 but lost out in the sprint race. The Yamaha rider certainly had front-running pace but took himself out of contention in Race 2 with a jump start that sent him into a double long lap while Rea escaped.

Scott Redding (Aruba.it Racing – Ducati) started off in perfect fashion with a fulminant victory in Race 1, but things then went from bad to worse. A mistake at T6 sent him wide in the Superpole Race and relegated him behind Rea and Razgatlioglu with no chance to fight back.

While it was a minor and forgivable error that cost the Ducati rider in the sprint race, the damage was done in Race 2. Battling with Rea, Redding went down at T4 and although he re-joined the race to salvage two points, he later lost them due to a post-race six-second penalty for a jump start.

In the past, Rea didn’t win his titles on speed alone. He won them on consistency and staying error-free when his opponents stumbled. Sometimes you don’t have to be the outright fastest. Sometimes it’s enough to be the cleverest and Rea looks to still hold an advantage in that department.

Tyre drama. Again.

After the choice between slicks, intermediates and full wets proved crucial at Aragon, tyres yet again played a major role in proceedings at Estoril.

Redding went into all three races on the softer SCX tyre, a compound he previously thought impossible as a race option. He used it to full potential in Race 1 to get the jump on the rest of the field at lights out and made the tyre last the distance to clinch victory.

In Race 2, however, Redding crashed on the SCX. The Ducati rider admitted that he had issues with the front tyre when Rea closed in on him and lamented post-race that he shouldn’t have attacked straight away and instead get “the tyre to settle and then go again at the end”.

Rea meanwhile took a ‘go with what you know’-approach by opting for the harder SC0 compound in all three runs – including the sprint race where the softer tyre is the standard choice. The Northern Irishman made his tyres work over all distances and looked to have the edge in terms of tyre performance over his opponents in the long races.

It’s only been two Rounds, but it appears that tyre choices will be a talking point throughout the season.

“I really felt nervous at the start because we did all our work this weekend with the SC0 rear tyre. It was stable and I liked the feeling, but the majority of riders were using the SCX tyre which means nothing if I’m confident I’ve made the right choice, but I wasn’t! I was thinking ‘what if it backfires?’”

Jonathan Rea

Faith restored at HRC

HRC’s start to the season at Aragon was frankly sobering. Two retirements and no finish inside the top 6 from either Team HRC rider, Alvaro Bautista or Leon Haslam, did not reflect the quality of the Fireblade CBR1000RR-R. Leandro Mercado (MIE Racing Honda) even sat out the Estoril Round to focus on development.

But Honda were able to take flight in Portugal and showed more of their project’s potential. Bautista had his qualifying lap cancelled due to yellow flags and was forced to start from 18^th on the grid. He fought his way up into eighth in Race 1 but narrowly missed out on the top 9 in the Superpole Race, meaning he would go into Race 2 yet again from row six.

The Spaniard confirmed his pace and found a good rhythm to make his way up the pecking order. Bautista eventually crossed the line in seventh, even though he admitted that he experienced trouble with the front end on the slippery circuit.

Haslam too scored points in both long races with two 12^th place finishes.

The positive signs are reason for optimism and Bautista acknowledged that now his “confidence starts to return again for sure,” and that he will “arrive quite strong” at the next Round in Misano.

One crash too many?

Riders crashing and taking other riders down with them is a reality of racing. It is never intentional and riders generally accept it – it happens to them and they will do it to others. A problem arises when it is always one and the same rider that takes others into the gravel.

For the second week in a row, Garrett Gerloff (GRT Yamaha WorldSBK Team) was involved in an incident that impacted another rider’s race. While seven days ago in Aragon, Rea managed to stay on his bike and completed the race, the stint was over for Michael Ruben Rinaldi (Aruba.it Racing – Duacti) when Gerloff wiped him out on the second lap of Race 2 at Estoril.

The American misjudged the situation going into T4 and was merely a passenger when his Yamaha almost highsided. Race direction deemed the incident irresponsible riding and Gerloff received a penalty that will see him start his next race from pit lane.

Gerloff is not moving on concerning territory yet, but he would be well advised to calm his approach in the early stages of a race.

“I rolled off the throttle earlier than normal because I knew I had the draft from the guys in front of me. I grabbed the brakes a little bit earlier and had the rear wheel come up off the ground a bit and it kicked me to the inside. I had to release the brake a bit and it was then that things got a little bit out of control.”

Garrett Gerloff

Rookies on the rise

The class’s new arrivals took the headlines on Saturday morning as three rookies qualified in the top 10. Lucas Mahias (Kawasaki Puccetti Racing) was in seventh while Tito Rabat (Barni Racing Team) found better pace on the Ducati to start the race in eighth and Andrea Locatelli (Pata Yamaha with BRIXX WorldSBK) qualified in ninth.

Locatelli’s weekend became even better on Sunday. The Italian was promoted straight into the Yamaha factory outfit after dominating the WorldSSP championship and proved the decision right with an impressive performance in Race 2.

Locatelli had a clean race and avoided the incidents happening around him to make up seven positions and finish fifth. On his way he defeated the likes of Bautista and Michael van der Mark (BMW Motorrad WorldSBK Team) while also ending the race ahead of former world champion Tom Sykes (BMW Motorrad WorldSBK Team).

“It’s incredible. It’s just the second weekend for me in World Superbike but the feeling with the bike is fantastic and I learnt lots during the weekend. We did a really good job and also with the new team we worked really well. I need to learn a lot more, for sure, but I’m really happy with this race.”

Andrea Locatelli