Bassani’s WorldSBK progression, ‘I need a podium’

Axel Bassani showed his skill and aggression on the MotoCorsa Ducati to make his way to fourth in Race Two at Phillip Island, having been fifth in the wet Race One. Not bad after qualifying 14th in Superpole for the WorldSBK season opener.

On Sunday in the media scrum he explained how it was all done.

“Not easy because today we fight with the world champions of Superbike, Jonny [Rea] and Toprak [Razgatlioglu],” Bassani explained. “It’s not easy to overtake those guys. So I had to cause Johnny and also Toprak to close the door every corner and Phillip Island it’s not easy to overtake. But after a lot of laps, I find the way to overtake.

“After, we had a really good pace. I think if I overtake before, we had the possibility to arrive on the podium but we have also three races in Mandalika next week.

“If you work good from the Friday, we can find a good solution for the podium. We will see. It’s not easy. It’s really high the level this year. We need to start better from Friday.”

Bassani used the big screen live TV feed, shown to the Aussie fans out on track, to notice that another fast Ducati privateer, Philipp Oettl, was closing on and closing in fast during Race Two.

“Yeah, I saw Philipp!” said Axel. “I said, ‘No, Philipp, you don’t overtake me today.’ I tried to arrive in P4 and we finished the work so I’m really happy. Now we need to understand, to find the solution to do a better Superpole because it’s a problem for me. We don’t have a really good first lap. I want to find a solution for Mandalika. With the extra grip of the new tyre, we have a lot of problems. I don’t know why, but now I need to understand.”

In the race that also means slower starts than he wants. “With the new tyre, it’s more difficult than with