Althea Racing

The 2012 eni Superbike World Championship comes to its conclusion this weekend at Magny-Cours, Francia. Althea Racing’s Carlos Checa and Davide Giugliano have fond memories of the 2011 edition of this race and each has his own objectives for the final round of the 2012 season.

Two weeks ago at the Portuguese track of Portimao, Carlos was back on the podium in race 1 and subsequently battled his way through the pack to take fifth place in the second race. Davide was struck by more bad luck, knocked off his bike in race 1 and forced to retire from the second due to technical problems.

Turn the clock back one year and Magny-Cours was the setting for Checa’s World Championship victory. Having arrived at the French track just three points short of what he needed, Carlos aimed to do the job in style, and that’s exactly what he did, dominating throughout the weekend before securing the double race win come race day.

And this was not all - over in the STK 1000 category Althea’s Davide Giugliano was also celebrating title success, after a fifth place finish in his race assured him of overall first position in the Superstock 1000 FIM Cup. Thanks to the Althea Racing team’s performance at Magny-Cours, Ducati also lifted the manufacturer’s trophy in both the SBK and Stock 1000 categories, meaning a quadruple cause for celebration.

In 2012, Magny-Cours will host the final round of the season, and it will also be the final outing for the Ducati 1198. With the arrival of the new 1199 Panigale, Althea’s Checa and Giugliano hope to bid a fond farewell to the 2011 championship winning bike by scoring the best possible results this Sunday. Although Carlos is no longer in the mix for the title, he is in with a mathematical chance of closing in overall second or third position in the standings. Davide lies in eleventh position but will be going all out to finish his rookie year inside the top ten.

Carlos Checa:

“I have great memories of this track in 2011 of course! It would be nice to round off the year with a podium place but as we have seen at recent rounds that is no easy task for us now. I am not thinking about the points or the final classification, I have taken it one race at a time and so will continue to do that this weekend, putting all my efforts into finishing the 2012 season in the best way we can. It remains to be seen as to whether we’ll be racing in pouring rain, always a possibility at Magny-Cours in October, but I’m prepared to do my best whatever the conditions.”