INTERVIEW
HONDA RACING WORLDSBK BOSS RONALD TEN KATE
P88
which he doesn't know, is an-
other point. He got used to it fairly
quickly. He's learned much about
the tire—we got him very quickly to
understand that when he taps into
the throttle that he needs to pick
up the bike and go to the fat part
of the tire. That's what he does
now as well. Also, changing his
riding style a bit from just swerv-
ing in and making a round corner
to try to make him square off
the corners more. For example,
as Jonathan Rea in corner two,
Jonathan always almost over-
shoots the corner and then brings
it back over the curb. That's what
we would like to see with Jake as
well, which he is doing.
This year's been tough
with the new CBR1000 SP2.
Where can you guys improve?
What do you think you need to
change?
It's been more than tough.
We are working on a lot. The
bike came late because of the
earthquakes in Japan last year,
which was a major setback for
the production of the machine.
So, it arrived only in January to
our workshop, and unfortunately
it doesn't come like full-on HRC
package where you just fire up
the bike and take it to the track. It
comes with mirrors on it.
You get a street bike.
Yes. We are a dealership and
normally we take machines from
the dealership floor and transport
it to the race department and built
it into a race bike. That's how we
operate. Really, it's a production
bike.
What's been the big development
change with this new bike as opposed to
the old bike?
Well, there was a change in rules as well.
Last year we had Ride-By-Wire on the bike
already but it was a home-built system where
we also had the separate throttles. So, we
were mastering the one and two and soon
The variety of
WorldSBK is
there, but Ronald
still believes the
rules need to be
tweaked.
