Oliveira on BMW’s new fairing: "We don’t spend so much time leaning the bike here… that’s where we believe the fairing can have a big effect"
A revised fairing was spotted on the BMW M1000RR machine during practice at Balaton Park
Innovation never stops and the ROKiT BMW Motorrad WorldSBK Team showed off a slightly revised fairing for Miguel Oliveira in Free Practice 1 for the MOTUL FIM Superbike World Championship at the Balaton Park Circuit. The new design is on the bottom part of the fairing, as the pictures in the gallery above show, and both Team Principal Shaun Muir and Oliveira spoke about the new fairing.
BMW had a tricky day at Balaton Park, with Oliveira inside the top ten while teammate Danilo Petrucci lost time in FP1 due to an airbox issue and he lost more time in FP2 after a lowside crash at Turn 3. ‘Petrux’ was taken to the medical centre following the fall and was diagnosed with a left wrist contusion and will be reassessed ahead of Saturday morning’s action. Oliveira’s best time was a 1’39.684s, while Petrucci posted a 1’40.164s.
Discussing the new fairing in FP2, Team Principal Shaun Muir said: “The setups aren't too different from the last two races. We’re trying to get the guys settled in. We haven't transferred the settings from Portimao and Assen well; it's not too comfortable for Miguel at the moment. We worked on the electronics between the two Free Practices for him. We thought the first impression would be good, but, while I haven't had time to speak to him, it doesn't look like he's settled in. He’s getting plenty of orange sectors, but they’re not all strung together in one lap; he needs to just string them together and get them into one lap. I don't think the new piece will be a big difference, there are very few differences on the bike from Portimao and Assen, I think it's more a matter of familiarising themselves with the circuits to come. Miguel just needs to acclimate themselves to the package.”
Speaking after he finished in P9 on Friday, Oliveira said: “The idea is to try to get the best out of our package with what we can do. For here at Balaton Park, it’s quite a specific track so you don’t spend so much time leaning the bike in the corners and that’s probably where we believe this fairing can have a big effect. For Balaton, it’s difficult to identify exactly. We haven’t done a back-to-back check, but we’re pretty sure we can assess this new part in the near future when we’ve gathered more experience with different track layouts.”
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