BARNI DUCATI 1199 PANIGALE R SUPERSTOCK
RACER TEST
P68
Superstock Championship also
came after it had finished runner-
up in the series three times in
succession, starting when cur-
rent factory Superbike rider Da-
vide Giugliano last won the title
in 2011 for Ducati on a Team Al-
thea 1098R. Since then, Ioda
MotoGP rider Danilo Petrucci,
the spectacular Eddi LaMarra
(who it's good to report has now
recovered from the serious head
injuries sustained testing an 1199
Superbike, and has resumed rid-
ing motorcycles although he's ap-
parently not able to hold a racing
license again) and former 2007
champion Niccolò Canepa have
all finished second in the end-of-
season points table for the Barni
Ducati team, before 22-year old
Leandro Mercado finally went
one better this past season.
Better known as Tati to his fans
on both sides of the Atlantic, Mer-
cado moved to Italy the following
season to race there, winding
up in World Superbike with the
privateer Pedercini Kawasaki
team before stepping down to
Superstock 1000 to rebuild his
career aboard the Barni Ducati.
In clinching Ducati's long-await-
ed fifth 1000cc FIM Superstock
crown, Mercado has put both
himself and the Panigale on the
map at last, because by winning
two of the seven rounds (with
Czech teammate Ondrej Jezek
taking a third such victory), Mer-
cado and the Barni team have
demonstrated that, on something
resembling a level playing field
without the extreme form of elec-
tronic intervention permitted by
current World Superbike rules,
the Ducati Panigale R desmo
V-twin is now very competitive
against its four-cylinder rivals. The
chance to ride Mercado's bike
at Mugello the week before he
clinched the title at Magny-Cours
(on the same day I tested Chaz
Davies' full-on factory F14 Pani-
gale Superbike) underlined this,
cemented by Ducati's victory in
the 2014 IDM German Superbike
Championship with Xavi Fores,
and the Barni Ducati team's dou-
ble-up success in clinching the
Italian CIV Superbike crown with
Ivan Goi on a slick-shod version
of Mercado's FIM Superstock
title-winning bike.
For to create the title-winning
1199 Superstock Ducati, Barni
Leandro
Mercado won
the 2014 FIM
Superstock
1000 Series
aboard what
started out as
a stock 1199
Panigale.
