News 4 Mar 2013

Curtain wins opening Formula Oz round of the season for Yamaha

Yamaha Racing with Ipone kicked off their 2013 campaign in solid fashion.

Kevin Curtain did double duty on the YZF-R1 at Eastern Creek. Image: Keith Muir.

Kevin Curtain did double duty on the YZF-R1 at Eastern Creek. Image: Keith Muir.

Yamaha Racing with Ipone kicked off their 2013 campaign in solid fashion with team riders pulling down plenty of podium results as their racing season got underway over the weekend.

Under cloudy skies at Sydney’s Motorsport Park, a big turnout of riders rolled up for the opening round of the Australian FX-Superbike Championship.

YRT with Ipone pilots Kevin Curtain and Rick Olson are ideally placed after the first round across the three classes they competed in.

The ageless Curtain again proved the man to beat, taking a faultless three wins from three starts in the Formula OZ class on board his Yamaha R1.

Curtain man-handled his R1 around the fast and flowing Eastern Creek circuit to take the perfect score from the opening round and enjoyed his time on the thundering Formula Oz machine.

He tried to replicate that performance in the FX-Superbike class but came up just short taking second for the round on the back of his 2-1-3 race finishes. His haul of 67 points leaves him just three from round winner Matthew Walters and ideally placed as the championship moves onto round two.

“The aim of any opening round is to not do anything stupid and get yourself in contention for when things get serious,” Curtain said. “We were able to do that today and are well placed as we move forward.

“Everything went pretty smoothly today and it’s good to get the new season underway without too much drama.”

Teammate Olson also enjoyed at solid day on the race track and is well placed despite a DNF in race two of the FX600 class. Olson was able to control the damage with a second and a race win in the other two legs to snare fourth place for the round.

Like Curtain, Olson was also on double duties and he locked down third place in the FX-Superbike category right behind Curtain. Olson took 3-2-6 place finishes in a consistent days racing and Olson is optimistic things can only improve at the coming rounds.

“Today wasn’t a bad start, apart from the DNF on the 600, it was a reasonable start to the year,” he explained. “I feel there is some room for improvement in my riding but its only round one and with a bit more bike time I should be right for the next round.”

Team manager John Redding was happy with the start of the season for his YRT with Ipone team.

“The weekend through up some challenging conditions with showers on and off during the weekend so it was really important for the riders to keep a calm head and not doing anything that could jeopardize their championship hopes,” Redding said.

“Everyone came through unscathed and with some good results so now we can move onto the next round with a good base to work from and keep improving.”

Recent