During a recent test for the Kawasaki Racing Team Superbike squad at Motorland Aragon WSS Champion Kenan Sofuoglu was given the chance to ride the official Kawasaki SBK machine for a few sessions
Sofuoglu is part of the Kawasaki Mahi Racing Team India Supersport World Championship team at present, having won the title with Kawasaki in 2012, making the Turkish rider a three-time WSS champion in all.
He was invited to ride the official KHI Superbike to see how he understood the machine that Tom Sykes and Loris Baz compete with on a regular basis in 2013.
Kenan was given approximately three hours of testing on the KRT machine and provided good feedback and comments, noting the big difference between his regular Ninja ZX-6R and the full Superbike Spec Ninja ZX-10R, particularly in the field of electronics and the absolute levels of pure race equipment.
It was also a useful test to help Kawasaki start to understand the potential of new technical rules, which are expected to come in for the 2014 season, instigated in order to help championship rights holders Dorna to put even more bikes on grid next year.
"I have to say thank you very much to Kawasaki as I recently got the opportunity to test the full Superbike and get a feeling for it." Sofuoglu stated. "What I understood from this short session on track is that a modern day Superbike has a lot of electronics, even compared to a Supersport bike and that aspect of SBK racing is also very much geared to every individual rider.
"I think I would need to spend many days on the bike to find out where you need electronics. Mahi racing wants to move to Superbike next year so there are many things to speak about now.
"Kawasaki has opened a door for me with this test so thanks to them and the team for that opportunity. One thing is sure - the Kawasaki Ninja ZX-10R is one of the very best Superbikes out there.‰Û
