[Qualifying Race] Friday 29th July/Sunny

*Team GREEN Wins Ticket to Participate in the Top 10 Trial

The day the Qualifying Race was held was a hot summer day with high humid weather. First (Red Arm Badge), Second (Yellow Arm Badge) and 3rd (White Arm Badge) racers made 2 attacks each sessions held in the morning and afternoon.

The top ten teams won a ticket to participate in the Top 10 Trial that was held on Saturday. For other teams the result of the Qualifying Test was their starting grid. Yanagawa, Watanabe, Haslam of the GREEN Team marked 2min.9sec.673, 2min7sec.834, 2min.7sec.563 and won third position overall and participated in the Top 10 Trial held on Saturday.

[Top 10 Trial] Saturday 30th July/Sunny

Team GREEN Wins Third Position with 293.8km Maximum Speed

The Top 10 Trial was held on a sunny day. Two racers from each team made a time attack for a single Lap to determine their starting grid. First to challenge were teams that were 6th to 10th in the qualifying race. The 10 racers made their attacks and followed by the 10 racers of the top five teams.

Team GREEN was third in the Qualifying Test held the day before and Watanabe was the first to make an attack. He challenged with strong will, but lost time at sector 2 when rear wheels slipped. But attracted fans with his aggressive performance from the back straight to the chicane.

At sector 4 Watanabe marked 23sec.314 and came top among the 20 racers participating in the Top 10 Trial. Lap He hit an amazing record of 2min.7sec.730.

Haslam also had a slight wheel slip at the Degner Curve but performed excellently from sector 1 to sector 3 with a record of 2min.6sec.469. He made fastest record of 293.8km among the 20 racers that participated and won third grid.

[Final] Sunday 31st July/Sunny

Team GREEN Wins Second Place on the Podium with a Last Minute Booth

Yanagawa started with Le Mans style. He wasn’t informed until the day of the Final that he would be first but made a good response. He deliberately avoided the leading group to avert careless accidents and finished the opening Lap at 7th position which was later raised to 5th position by maintaining a stable pace.

Yanagawa broke away from a back marker on Lap 10 and entered the pit on Lap 28 where he switched with Watanabe.

Watanabe was in fifth position at start but soon raised himself to fourth position. The surface of the course was around 60 degrees Celsius and some sections were blocked with yellow flags because of some machines had made overturns, but Watanabe kept an average Lap time of 2min.10sec. and entered the pit at Lap 54.

Leon Haslam participated the third stint. Two hours had passed since the race started. The temperature was 34 degrees Celsius at 1:30PM but sensory temperature was higher than 40 degrees Celsius. Under these conditions, Haslem successfully marked a 2min.9sec.103 best Lap time and gradually reduced his distance with Team YOSHIMURA SUZUKI SHELL ADVANCE.

There was a time lag around 17 seconds when Haslam left the pit but thirty minutes later at Lap 70, it was shortened to 6 seconds. On the next Lap he was able to shorten it to 3 seconds due to the fact that Team YOSHIMURA SUZUKI SHELL ADVANCE had its pace disturbed by a back marker. And on Lap 74, Haslam finally overtook and came third in position.

During that Lap, Team MUSASHI RT HARC-PRO who were in second position had trouble with the machine and stopped at the MC chicane. All of a sudden, Haslam was in second position.

The time was 2:30PM. At Lap 80, Haslam entered the pit to change with Yanagawa for his fourth stint. Pit work only took 15 seconds and all was working as expected.

The surface of the course was still around 60 degrees Celsius but Yanagawa made a maximum speed record of 2min9sec. 655 and steadily kept second position. However in Lap 102, he was overtaken by Team YOSHIMURA SUZUKI SHELL ADVANCE and came third. But he continued to keep his pace and entered the pit at Lap 108.

Watanabe got back in the course for the second time at the 5th stint. Keeping an average of 2min.10sec., he reduced his distance between Team YOSHIMURA SUZUKI SHELL ADVANCE. Watanabe’s maximum speed was above 291km. Also he recorded 2min9sec.866 at Lap 123 which was maximum stint record and handed the motorcycle over to Haslam on Lap 135.

Around 4:30PM, sunlight was still intense but surface temperature had decreased slightly to 52 degrees Celsius. The condition of the course began to get better. This helped Haslem to continuously record 2min.9sec..

He reduced the 6 second distance between Team YOSHIMURA SUZUKI SHELL ADVANCE in no time at all. At Lap 138 to 139 The race was nip and tuck till finally at Lap140 Team GREEN once again was in second position. After that they continued to develop advantage.

At Lap 143, the Team made its best record, 2min.8sec.805 per Lap and by surprise at the end of the stint their distance between Team YOSHIMURA SUZUKI SHELL ADVANCE was more than 20 seconds. The machine was handed over to Watanabe again for his third session.

In the last two hours before the goal, only three machines had made the same number of Laps. The machine in fourth position was three Laps behind. Watanabe’s mission was not to shorten the distance with the top racer but to keep the machine in its position and hand it over to Haslam for the last stint.

Temperature of the air and the course were both settling down and Watanabe could have challenged for his best record but instead he sticked to hold his time at around 2min.10sec.. By keeping a steady pace he was able to achieve a competitive advantage against Team YOSHIMURA SUZUKI SHELL ADVANCE . Watanabe made a last pit stop at Lap 191 to hand the machine over to Haslam.

It was less than an hour till the checker goal and Haslam was the one in charge of the last stint. The distance between Team GREEN and the top was not close but they had competitive advantage against Team YOSHIMURA SUZUKI SHELL ADVANCE following from behind and Haslam passed the checker goal at a steady pace between 2min.9sec. to 2min.10sec. at second position.

Team GREEN made a total number of 218 Laps. It was a hard race with more than 30 overturns, but luckily the Team didn’t face any serious accidents. Team GREEN was the only Team that passed the checker goal with the same Laps as the Victory team. It was a perfect race with no red flags nor safety cars required.

*Max. Speed: 295.8km/h *Max. Speed per Lap: 2min.8sec.805 *No.of Laps: 218

→Read the full article. (*Japanese)

Original Source[ KAWASAKI MOTORS JAPAN ] (*Japanese)