Press release:
It was a long testing weekend for Leon Camier making his debut appearance for the Aprilia World Superbike Team at Magny Cours. After two extremely fraught races the 23-year-old was forced to retire from both races with electrical and mechanical problems. Camier who first sat on the Aprilia on Friday morning made massive progress over the weekend and was up to 11th in the opening race and ninth in the second race when problems struck.
Camier, who got through to the second Superpole session and secured 16th place on the qualifying grid, was eager to gain two good starts in both races. In the opening 23-lap race he was lying in 17th position after the first lap but soon was working his way through the fierce World Superbike pack and was fighting for positions. Camier had to take evasive action to miss the crashed bike of Tom Sykes but was soon making good progress and was sitting on the back of former team mate Shakey Byrne, Fonsi Nieto and Jakub Smrz in a fight for ninth position. With only three laps remaining of the race Camier’s bike suffered an electrical problem which had a knock on effect to the fuel pump forcing him to retire with only three laps to go.
Camier gained a better start in the second race and was 15th into the first turn and 14th at the end of the opening lap. He was soon locked in a battle with the two BMW riders of Ruben Xaus and two times World Champion Troy Corser, by lap three he had got the better of the two older Superbike riders and was sitting in 11th place behind Smrz. Corser was putting up a fight with Leon and the two were changing places on each lap, Smrz retired from the race on lap eight, and Leon was through to tenth by lap nine having made another pass on Corser. Camier had just made two solid passes on Nieto and Corser and had moved through to a good ninth place when a problem forced him to pull into the pits and DNF.
The new British Superbike Champion from Kent was putting in some stunning lap times at the end of his races; they were consistent and as fast as the guys running in fourth place. This stood him in with a good chance of two very solid top ten finishes; sadly this was not to be but showed the potential for the final round in two weeks time in Portugal.
A disappointed Camier:
“I’m really gutted not to have been able to get any results for the Aprilia team, we’ve not had a problem all weekend with the bike and then in both races we had to retire. I was feeling good out there and was happy at the progress I made in both races and was pushing for a top ten position. I’ve learnt so much in the last three days and it’s been a real rollercoaster of a weekend. I just hope that I can qualify a little better at Portimao and get two good results there for the Aprilia. In the meantime I’ll return to my normal duties at Airwaves Yamaha for the final round of the British Superbike Championship at Oulton Park next weekend before heading to Portimao the following weekend and back on the Aprilia. I’d like to thank the Aprilia team for this opportunity and hope things will go better at the last round.”
Next stop – Oulton Park, BSB Finale, 9th – 11th October.
www.leoncamier.com
Photo credit: www.racingaprilia.com
