Xavi Vierge ended the European leg of pre-season testing with a crash in mixed conditions
Yesterday at 03:27 AM
Team HRC and Xavi Vierge ended their Portimao Test early after a difficult day in mixed conditions.
The final day of the Portimao World Superbike Test was a difficult day for all the riders. However, Team HRC were hit the hardest. With one rider out of action, all responsibilities fell to Xavi Vierge, who had to end his day early after a crash.
Vierge did most of his testing duties on Tuesday and tested different setup changes from the base setting he found at Jerez. However, in the mixed conditions on Wednesday, the Spaniard crashed whilst testing some flag-to-flag scenarios.
"Like Jerez, we haven't been too lucky with the weather here," Vierge stated after the test.
"Yesterday was better, but the conditions weren't ideal with some patches of the track that stayed wet all day, especially in corners 4 and 13, even though the sun came out from midday onwards.
"That said, we were able to make progress throughout the day. And by the end, we'd found a good feeling with the race tyres. We started with a setup not too different from what we used at Jerez to see how it would work at this track, and I struggled a bit at first. We then made some changes to the suspension, and the feeling immediately improved.
"I'm really happy because we saw that with small adjustments, we were able to adapt the bike setup to a track that has very different characteristics to Jerez.
"Unfortunately, today we were faced with some rain that stopped and started throughout the day. We decided to make the most of the conditions and carry out some flag-to-flag tests, but then, unfortunately, I crashed at turn 1. I locked the front, and that ended our day.
"Luckily, it wasn't a big crash; I'm totally fine and in perfect shape for the final test and the first race in Australia. I can't wait for the season to start."
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