esbk.co

Yeah, yeah, so I haven’t been on top of the beginning of the season.  I plan to try to rectify that slowly, but first, lets see where we are at the moment.

FIM e-Power

They were the first out of the gate with a race, and that’s pretty much all of the excitement.  eCRP is not racing this year (or at least in any series I know of) so Muench has no one to really push them.  This year the e-Power series consists of five races, the last three of which are combined events with the TTXGP.  So far they have raced at Magny-Cours and Hungaroring.  In Magny-Cours only 3 bikes showed, and 2 of them were Muench bikes.  Muench added a second rider this year.  She is Katja Poensgen, a former Euro SuperStock 750 and 250GP rider.  It seems she is still getting up to speed, but I think we need to be watching for her at Laguna.  The third is team EPO Bike ridden by Christian Amendt.  Also a German team, they are off the pace of the Muench, but at least they are there.  I am sure bike is progressing in leaps and bounds.  Anyway, here’s how the first 2 rounds looked after the checkered flag:

Round 1

CL	Dossard	Pilote	Country	Manufacturer	Time	Delay	Score
1	49	HIMMELMANN MATTHIAS		MUENCH TTE	15m42s953	-	25
2	65	POENSGEN KATJA		MUENCH TTE	16m14s422	31s469	20
3	36	AMENDT CHRISTIAN		NC	17m33s657	1m50s704	16

Round 2

CL	Dossard	Pilote	Country	Manufacturer	Time	Delay	Score
1	65	POENSGEN KATJA		MUENCH TTE		-	25
2	4	AMENDT CHRISTIAN		EPO BIKE EPO BIKE		32s904	20

Himmelmann’s bike had an issue with its 12V battery during the race, and the bike failed to finish.  As you can see Amendt was much closer to Poensgen this time around.  Whether that is due to improvements to the bike, the track, or both, I do not know.

Championship Standings

#	Name	Country	Total	FRA	HUN
1	MUENCH TTE		50	25	25

I will add this.  So far I seem to be completely off on my prediction that Muench was going to have a monster bike.  Although it has been said that one bike has a new motor and the other a new pack they are testing, and Himmelmann has not yet shown the bike’s true potential by playing the same ol’ tactic of sitting on second place and then mugging them at the end, times have not really improved over last year.  Again, Laguna will force them to show their hand.

TTXGP

Australian Series

The Aussies were the first to race for the TTXGP this year.  I had thought we would see a bigger grid, but just Ripperton and Catavolt made it to the first round.  However, both bikes appear to have been dramatically improved over the winter.  For the best information on this series visit evmotorcycle.org.  Here’s the results from the first round:

Round 1

Results

2012 FX NATIONAL SERIES ROUND 2 – WAKEFIELD PARK APRIL 21 & 22

Date: 21/04/12 Event: R06 Weather: Fine & Partly Cloudy – Temp: 24.8C Track: Dry – Temp: 22C

eFXC Race 1 PROVISIONAL CLASSIFICATION

Started at: 13:51:39 Laps: 4 Starters: 2 Printed at: 15:33

Pos

No

Gr

Name

Machine

Laps

Time

Behind

Fastest

On Lap

1

46

Daniel SAILER (NSW) / Ripperton Racing

Yamaha R1

4

5:11.417

1:15.607

2

2

100

Jason MORRIS (NSW) / Solar Power Australia

Catavolt

4

5:11.913

.496

1:16.169

3

Fastest Lap was 1:15.607 by Daniel SAILER (NSW)

Current race record for eFXC class – 1:20.608 by Daniel SAILER (NSW) on a Yamaha R1 set on 08/10/11

2012 YMF LOAN YAMAHA AUSTRALIAN FX-SUPERBIKE CHAMPIONSHIP ROUND 2 – WAKEFIELD PARK APRIL 21 & 22

Race 2

Date: 22/04/12 Event: R22 Weather: Fine & mostly cloudy – Temp: 16.1C Track: Wet – Temp: 18C

eFXC Race 2 PROVISIONAL CLASSIFICATION

Started at: 13:20:08 Laps: 4 Starters: 2 Printed at: 13:26

Pos

No

Name

Machine

Laps

Time

Behind

Fastest

On Lap

1

100

Jason MORRIS (NSW) / Solar Power Australia

Catavolt

4

5:12.388

1:15.852

3

2

46

Daniel SAILER (NSW) / Ripperton Racing

Yamaha R1

4

5:13.592

1.204

1:15.633

3

Fastest Lap was 1:15.633 by Daniel SAILER (NSW)

Current race record for eFXC class – 1:20.608 by Daniel SAILER (NSW) on a Yamaha R1 set on 08/10/11

North American Series

Well, as usual it has been a relatively exciting, yet unexpected season.  There really never seems to be a lack of drama or “WTF” moments in this series.  Right off the bat we had no less than nine bikes expected to show up at Inifinion Raceway.  However, both TTX75 bikes did not make it, cutting it down to the two Lightning bikes, the lone Brammo, and no less than 4 Zero S ZF9s.  The Zeros were in the new, and exclusive to NA, eSuperStock class.  Well, the Brammo, with it’s new motor, not only high-sided Steve Atlas in Friday’s practice, but then high-sided Steve Rapp in Saturday’s qualifying too!  After having rebuilt the bike once, the team packed it up for the weekend, leaving them with no points and little data for the weekend.  Then the Lightning bikes took turns actually finishing each race.  It was a 2 race round, so the points got distilled at the end.  Here are the results.

Round 1

Race 1

Pos	Nos.	Name	Team	Laps	Diff	Total Time	Best lap
1	80	Michael Barnes	Lightning	8		15:46.948	1:51.548
2	5	Martin Szwarc	Martin Szwarc	8	2:10.726	17:57.675	2:11.428
3	96	Kenyon Kluge	K Squared	7	1 lap	16:16.636	2:13.022
4	7	Kyle Schumacher	Ritz Racing	7	1 lap	16:30.108	2:19.537
5	619	Ernest Montague	Ritz Racing	7	1 lap	17:05.143	2:23.605
6	89	Tim Hunt	Lightning	2	6 laps	Retired

Race 2

Pos	Nos.	Name	Team	Laps	Diff	Total Time	Best lap
1	89	Tim Hunt	Lightning	9		17:40.937	1:55.942
2	5	Martin Szwarc	Martin Szwarc	8	1 lap	18;05.551	2:10.748
3	96	Kenyon Kluge	K Squared	8	1 lap	18:13.873	2:14.629
4	7	Kyle Schumacher	Ritz Racing	7	1 lap	18:44.123	2:19.070
5	619	Ernest Montague	Ritz Racing	7	1 lap	19:13.168	2:23.208
6	80	Michael Barnes	Lightning	2	DNF	Retired	1:50.96

Round 1 points

Pos	Nos	Name	Team	Race one	Race two	Weekend total	Championship points
1	5	Martin Szwarc	Martin Szwarc	20	20	40	25
2	96	Kenyon Kluge	K Squared	16	16	32	20
3	7	Kyle Schumacher	Ritz Racing	13	13	26	16
4	80	Michael Barnes	Lightning	25	DNF	25	13
4	89	Tim Hunt	Lightning	DNF	25	25	13
6	619	Ernest Montague	Ritz Racing	11	11	22	10

Now, it is my understanding that there was supposed to be a manufacturer’s championship as well, especially where most teams were bringing more than one bike, but I do not know how the points will be added up.  So here is my math using a few different methods for Round 1:

	Manufacturer	All bikes counted	Top 2 bikes counted	FIM rules
1	Zero	71	45	25
2	Lightning	26	26	13

Then the series went to PIR which is effectively a home race for Brammo.  Lightning did not show this round.  Word is from Electric Race News that the bike wasn’t back from the Isle of Man at that time.  4 Zero bikes showed up again, with almost all different riders, and in the TTX75 award class, bikes in the form of Virgina Tech’s Team Bolt and ProtoMoto showed up.  10 bikes were scheduled to be there, and 9 showed.  That’s pretty good, and shows an improvement in the series.  Here’s the results:

Round 2

Pilot	Team	Number	Total TIme	Best Time	Position
Steve Atlas	Team Icon Brammo	1	11:49.901  (9 laps)	1.17.768	1
Matt Kent	Virginia Tec Bolt	72	12:27.921  (8 laps)	1.32.613	2
Ely Schless	ProtoMoto	18	13:03.608  (8 laps)	1.36.009	3
Troy Siahaan	Motorcycle.com	111	13:32.065  (8 laps)	1.38.249	4
Chris Page	OMRRA Racing	9	13.32.218  (8 laps)	1.38.400	5
Kenyan kluge	K Squared Racing	96	13.32.437  (8 laps)	1.37.668	6
Don Headrick	OMRRA Racing	69	11.51.599  (7 laps)	1.37.727	7
Christopher Ancien	Moto Czsyz	12	DNS	-	-
Michael Czsyz	MotoCzsyz	11	DNS	-	-

So now, again by my math, the riders championship looks like this:

Pos	Name	Team	Championship points
1	Kenyon Kluge	K Squared	30
2	Martin Szwarc	Martin Szwarc	25
2	Steve Atlas	Team Icon Brammo	25
4	Matt Kent	Virginia Tec Bolt	20
5	Kyle Schumacher	Ritz Racing	16
5	Ely Schless	ProtoMoto	16
7	Michael Barnes	Lightning	13
7	Tim Hunt	Lightning	13
7	Troy Siahaan	Motorcycle.com	13
10	Chris Page	OMRRA Racing	11
11	Ernest Montague	Ritz Racing	10
12	Don Headrick	OMRRA Racing	9

And using my math again, the current manufacturers points using 3 different methods.

Pos	Manufacturer	All bikes counted	Top 2 bikes	FIM rules
1	Zero	114	69	38
2	Lightning	26	26	13
3	Brammo	25	25	25
4	VT Bolt	20	20	20
5	Proto Moto	16	16	16

I think it is very interesting that Kenyon Kluge is the only rider to actually race at all the rounds.  What does that do for someone?  It gives them the championship lead.  And that catches us up with the North American Series.  [whew]

European Series

It is mere days until Round 2 of the European series finds itself in Snetterton, so maybe it’s good timing on my part, for a change.  We have only had one round in this series so far and 5 bikes showed up for the first race.  It would have been 6 if the Muench’s second rider hadn’t had a previous contractual engagement.  Zongshen, Linden Racing, and Team Fiver joined the lone Muench bike on the grid.  Not bad for the first race of the season in Europe.  Here’s the results:

Round 1

Pos	No.	Name	Laps	Total time	Diff	Best time	In lap	Best speed
1	49	Matthias Himmelman	17	14:38.981		50.274	2	131.973
2	59	HoChi Fung	16	14:40.669	1 Lap	53.648	15	123.673
3	26	Tang Yu	16	14:50.603	9.934	54.486	3	121.771
4	53	Peter Lindén	16	15:18.109	37.440	55.901	4	118.688
5	5	Stefan Bernström	14	15:28.300	3 Laps	1:03.931	6	103.781

Rider’s Championship using my math:

Pos	No.	Name	Points
1	49	Matthias Himmelman	25
2	59	HoChi Fung	20
3	26	Tang Yu	16
4	53	Peter Lindén	13
5	5	Stefan Bernström	11

Manufacturer’s Championship using my math:

Pos	Manufacturer	All bikes counted	Top 2 bikes	FIM rules
1	Zongshen	36	36	20
2	Muench	25	25	25
3	Mavizen	24	24	13

There, I think that about covers it.  I hope you find this helpful, interesting, and fun.  KTRSD.