On Track Off Road No. 191

SBK
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One interesting little insight came
to light (to me anyway) at the last
race when Dorna issued the details
of the engines used per rider this
season. Each rider has an allocation
of seven engines and Alvaro
Bautista currently has six engines
‘in use’. That means he only has
one fresh engine left to use for
the season. I remember from days
gone by that the service intervals
on the likes of a 996 or 1099 were
really short and there were stories
that the Ducati engines were
so stressed to get the maximum
performance that they had to be
changed at the end of each day.
With my conspiracy theory hat on I
wondered if Ducati had started the
season with the wick turned up on
their engines to get the maximum
performance out of them, whilst
at the same time a few crossed
fingers to hope they will last. That,
however, may not be possible any
more given that all engines have
their maximum revs restricted
but it is an issue nonetheless why
Bautista has used so many engines
whilst Rea, by way of contrast,
has three unsealed and one
completely unallocated engine still
in his locker. We now come to the
final three races of the year with
circuits that have long straights,
Magny Cours, Villacum and Losail
so it will be interesting to see how
the Ducati fares.
We are in the home stretch of 2019
now and the coming weekend will
see JR have his first chance of
clinching the title. Magny Cours is
a favourite destination for him to
do so but the opportunity won’t
arise until Sunday. I expect it to
run until Argentina but then again I
didn’t expect Bautista to crash out
of the lead in Jerez or Misano. I am
now ready for anything.