Alessandro Zaccone (Ecosantagata Althea Racing Team) landed an emphatic first win in the FIM Supersport World Championship. The #16 hadn’t yet landed a podium, but not content with climbing on the bottom or the middle step of the rostrum, Zaccone punched his ticket all the way to the top step in Race 1, landing his first WorldSSP win at MotorLand Aragon
STARTING STRONG
Zaccone felt he could be successful on the Spanish circuit heading into the round, having landed a double at the track in the 2020 Moto2 European Championship season. He started the weekend well with his 1'53.642s Tissot Superpole time to tie his best-ever Superpole qualification and clock him in half a second off of Arenas in P1. After Can Oncu (Pata Yamaha Ten Kate Racing) was applied a back of the grid start penalty for a yellow flag procedure infringement during Warm Up 1, the Italian saw himself invited up to P5 for the start of Race 1.
“After 10 laps, I was a bit on the limit with the front tyre”
Zaccone had found a way past Tom Booth-Amos (PTR Triumph Factory Racing) and Aldi Mahendra (AS BLU CRU Racing Team) to see himself to P4 by the end of the first lap. He subsequently caught Valentin Debise (EASTROC ZXMOTO Factory Evan Bros Racing) for P3 on the run down the back straight into Turn 16 but beating Roberto Garcia (GMT94 Yamaha) and Albert Arenas (AS BLU CRU Racing Team) in their home round would be a taller order. By Lap 5, Zaccone had caught up to Garcia with a similar move on the brakes into Turn 16. From there, the 2025 MotoE World Champion showed his composure as he took his time to study Arenas’s lines and tendencies, never letting the Spaniard more than four tenths away from him as he waited until the final moments to start to turn it up a notch. Arenas led every lap of the race until Zaccone made a pass on the #75 on Turn 1, Arenas returned the favour on Turn 5, but with less time to put together a move before the long straight. Zaccone gave chase until Arenas went wide in Turn 14, dissolving the gap that he had, before the #16 hawked the Spaniard down on the back straight, and sailed to his first win in the category. The emotional win was made even sweeter as it was the team’s first win since the team’s founder, Genesio Belvilacqua, passed away in January of this year.
On how he landed his Race 1 win, Zaccone said: “We started well, when I saw I was behind Albert, I wanted to manage the race because there’s a big drop with the tyre here, after 10 laps I was a bit on the limit with the front tyre. In the last sector, we were really fast in the last sector with the Ducati’s top speed, but we lost a lot in the acceleration compared to the Yamaha, which is really fast on the slow-exit corners. I told the team the race would be decided in the last corner, so I tried to stay as close as possible. I passed him in the first sector to prevent him from building up too big of a gap. He passed me back, but I think the most important thing was his mistake in the Turn 15 chicane. He went long and exited super slow. I prepared well and was already ahead of him midway through the chicane. We need to keep putting the points together, but in Race 1, we did.
“In the Warm Up, we found something really important on the rear”
In Race 2, despite starting from P2, he plummeted to a P13 finish. He dropped positions quickly, falling to P10 by Lap 7; however, the big takeaway from the weekend was the first race. While Race 1 was just his first time on the podium, much less his first win, the #16 has been a consistent face in the top ten, missing that mark only four times this season. Zaccone hopes that he can find himself up in the fight at the front more frequently after the step they found with their Ducati Panigale V2 in the Warm Up session, as well as his home round at Misano just around the corner.
On the mentality Zaccone rode with to achieve his first WorldSSP win, Zaccone said: “It was an amazing race; we knew from the beginning of the weekend that we could be very fast here. I love this track; I always go very fast here. In the Warm Up on Saturday morning, we found something really important on the rear, and it helped the bike work really well all weekend. It started mentally, I felt strong, riding very good laps, and I knew that I could be fast. I used my bike's potential to the fullest in the last sector. I’m super super happy.”
Zaccone has his homecoming round next time out at Misano! Catch all the fireworks starting on Friday, June 12th, with the WorldSBK VideoPass! Now 50% off!