Pirelli brings a new rear development soft compound to Jerez for the sixth round of the WorldSBK season

Next weekend the MOTUL FIM Superbike World Championship will return to the Circuito de Jerez-Ángel Nieto, after a year’s absence (in which it was replaced by the Brno circuit), for the sixth round of the 2019 season. In the Spanish event all the championship classes will be on the schedule and the WorldSSP300 will have one more race to recover after the missed race due to bad weather in Imola.

To face this round Pirelli for the premier class confirms the larger solutions already seen in action in the last rounds, bringing also a new soft rear tyre, while for the FIM Supersport World Championship, the Milanese company's objective will be to evaluate the comparison between the rear solution in standard 180/60 size and the development one in larger 190/60 size.

This will be the first time that the Andalusian circuit will host the production derived series at the beginning of June, usually the appointment has always been scheduled for September or October. Pirelli knows the circuit very well even though since it was resurfaced in 2017 it has only run for a year; so the asphalt could still represent an unknown factor. The Circuito de Jerez-Ángel Nieto was inaugurated in December 1985 and then was named in memory of the thirteen times World Motorcycling Champion Ángel Nieto who died two years ago. At the beginning of the 90s, renovations were carried out to improve safety, with modifications in particular to the Sito Pons curve and the Senna chicane bringing the length of the track to 4223 metres. In 2002 the pit lane was lengthened and paved escape routes were built. Finally in 2017 the circuit was completely resurfaced after almost 10 years since the last resurfacing took place in 2008. The Jerez circuit has long straights, for a length equal to 69% of the entire track, and slow curves alternating with fast straights. The 600-metre long start-finish straight has a width of 12 metres, slightly wider than the rest of the track, where the width is 11 metres. As well as the aspect of the track, the radius of curvature is also variable, ranging from 30 to 116 metres, while the maximum gradient is 5% exiting the curve 5. The gradients are also different, with the maximum lateral gradient of 7.46% out of curves 2, 6 and 13, while the minimum is 4.70% at curves 4 and 12.

The solutions for the WorldSBK and WorldSSP classes:

Pirelli arrives at Jerez de la Frontera for the sixth round of the MOTUL FIM Superbike World Championship with a load of 3520 tyres that includes both dry (slick or treaded) and intermediate and full wet solutions for all three classes who will be on the track.

In the WorldSBK class, even in this round, the riders will only have tyres in the larger 125/70 front and 200/65 rear sizes for a total of 8 slick solutions. The front options already used in Aragón, Assen and Imola have all been confirmed. Riders will be able to choose between the front standard SC1 in 125/70 and in soft compound and the development SC2 X1071 and X1118 in medium compound. There are confirmations and a novelty for the rear options. At this round there will be the standard SC0 in 200/65 and the development Y0446, which uses the same structure as the standard SC0 but a compound more oriented to performance in the event of particularly high asphalt temperatures. The novelty is represented by the new development SC0 X1351 which uses the same compound as the standard SC0 but a new construction that guarantees an improvement in performance thanks to an increased footprint area. As regards the qualification and prequalification solutions, for the Jerez round Pirelli confirms the SCX in the Y0447 specification and the supersoft solution for Superpole^® in the X0684 specification.

In the WorldSSP category available to the riders there will be four dry solutions, two front and two rear ones. For the front, as in Aragón, Assen and Imola, the choice is between the standard SC1 and the development SC2 X0582, which offers greater grip and lower wear compared to the standard SC2. At the rear the standard SC0 in standard size 180/60 will be joined by the development SC0 Y0328 in an increased size 190/60, already taken to Assen and developed to offer greater stability and a longer life span.

The 2017 Pirelli statistics for Jerez

• Total number of tyres brought by Pirelli: 5175

• Number of solutions (including dry, intermediate and wet) for the WorldSBK class: 6 front and 6 rear

• Number of tyres available for each WorldSBK rider: 41 front and 35 rear

• Number of solutions for the WorldSSP class (including dry, intermediate and wet): 6 front and 5 rear

• Number of tyres available for each WorldSSP rider: 31 front and 28 rear

• WorldSBK Best Lap Awards both won by: Marco Melandri (Aruba.it Racing – Ducati),in 1'40.938 (Race 1, 15^th lap) and Jonathan Rea (Kawasaki Racing Team), in 1'40.640 (Race 2, 3^rd lap)

• WorldSSP Best Lap Award won by: Federico Caricasulo (GRT Yamaha Official WorldSSP Team), in 1'43.922 at the 4^th lap

• Temperature in Race 1: air 25° C, asphalt 39° C

• Temperature in Race 2: air 25° C, asphalt 38° C

• Maximum race speed reached by Pirelli DIABLO™ Superbike tyres: 290.3 km/h, in Race 2 by Michael Van Der Mark (Pata Yamaha Official WorldSBK Team) at the 17^th lap

• Maximum race speed reached by Pirelli DIABLO™ Supercorsa SC tyres in WorldSSP race: 249.7 km/h, by Michael Canducci (3570 Puccetti Racing FMI) at the 7^th lap.