Emanuele Pusceddu took victory in today’s third round race of the 2015 Pata European Junior Cup, powered by Honda moving up to second place in the overall standings with his third podium of the season.
Today’s scheduled nine-lap race with 29 identically-prepared Honda CBR650F machines, was red-flagged early on when a number of riders crashed at Imola’s final chicane – often the scene of dramatic racing incidents.
When the track was cleared, a six-lap dash followed in which Pusceddu dominated, beating fellow Italian Paolo Grassia by almost three seconds, with series leader and winner of the opening two rounds, Javier Orellana, finishing third.
In the FIM Europe Women’s European Cup race, Hungarian Viktoria Kis took the victory, coming home in 19th position overall after Anastassia Kovalenko of Estonia and New Zealand’s Avalon Biddle were caught up in earlier crashes.
«Today the CBR was fantastic!», Emanuele Pusceddu stated. «The setting was very good and I was able to be very, very fast. I pushed very hard on the first lap of the re-start because I knew it was a very short race and the other guys would be very close. So I am really happy to take this victory in Italy and I would like to dedicate the win to the memory of my friend’s grandfather – a very important person who died on Friday».
«It was a fairly dramatic race today and Imola’s notorious final chicane had yet another say in proceedings», commented Gerry Bryce, European Junior Cup Series Director. «We lost a few riders from the crash there but Emanuele Pusceddu set a blinding pace in the re-start and was able to ride away a little. Behind him, Javier Orellana had a good battle with Paolo Grassia and with those three on the podium again I think it’ll come down to the end of the season with them».
2015 Pata European Junior Cup, powered by Honda
Round three, Imola, Italy – Sunday, 10 May
1 E Pusceddu (ITA)
3 P Grassia (ITA)
3 J Orellana (ESP)
4 G De Gruttola (ITA)
5 G Raymond (FRA)
6 D Laville (FRA)
7 I Fernandez (ESP)
8 A Coppola (ITA)
9 H Cabuk (TUR)
10 S Wilford (GBR)
Championship standings after three of eight rounds:
1 Orellana 66
2 Pusceddu 57
3 Grassia 48
4 Raymond 33
5 Soomer 31
6 Laville 27
7 De Gruttola 24
8 Ciprietti 20
9 Coppola 20
10 Fernandez 17
