While the latest event at Donington Park was a home round for rider Bradley Ray, Imola is a home race for the entire Yamaha Motoxracing WorldSBK Team.
The seventh event on the 2023 Superbike World Championship calendar is also the second to be taking place on Italian soil. Another great opportunity (like Misano in June) for the squad to meet with its sponsors and supporters who will attend the races at the circuit dedicated to Enzo and Dino Ferrari.
Sandro Carusi’s team fared well during the British round, the young Englishman confirming his consistent progress and the bike, prepared by the Italian team’s technical staff, proving very competitive. The Imola round won’t be simple, due to the inevitable hot conditions but also the fact that this will be Ray’s first visit to the challenging circuit. As always however, the goal will be to reach the points zone in every race, a realistic result given the Yamaha Motoxracing WorldSBK Team’s current level.
The first brick of the Imola circuit was laid on 22 March 1950, but the track was not inaugurated until 1953. In those early days, it was known as the Santerno circuit, named after the river that delimits part of the track. It took on the name of Autodromo Dino Ferrari, in memory of Enzo Ferrari’s son, in 1970, but after Enzo himself died in 1988, it became known as the Autodromo Enzo e Dino Ferrari. As for motorcycling, the circuit gained international acclaim thanks to 200 Miles race, which ran between 1972 and 1985, while the world championship raced at the track for the first time in 1969. The first WorldSBK races were staged in 2001. The production-derived championship hasn’t visited Imola since 2019, an absence owing mainly to the effects of the global Covid-19 pandemic. Modernisation work was carried out in 2006, part of a project that lasted roughly two years and took in both the track and its facilities. The new ‘variante bassa’ dates back to 2009, while 70% of the track was resurfaced in 2011. The track measures 4.936 kilometres and comprises 22 turns, nine of which right-handers and thirteen left.
The full schedule for this second Italian round of the season is available at this link:
https://www.worldsbk.com/en/event/ITA1/2023
"This round is really important for us. We’ve continued to grow in recent races and hope to be able to confirm this positive trend at our home round. After Imola, we’ll start to work on our plans for the future.”
“I’m excited to race at Imola. It’ll be my first visit to the track, one I’ve only seen in videos, but I think it resembles some of the British tracks, with its undulation and blind turns – it looks like an old-style track. It’s meant to be very hot, but we’ll all be focused on doing our very best to score good results and continue along a path that brought results at Donington. I’ll try to give it my all, also because I know this is my team’s second home round and we’re all keen to do well in front of the sponsors and fans.”
