Top 10 Talking Points For The 2016 World Superbike Season

The long winter break from racing is almost over, as the 2016 World Superbike season will kick off in just over a week in Australia at the beautiful Phillip Island circuit. Jonathan Rea took the 2015 championship – his first world title – in convincing fashion, and with a new Kawasaki ZX-10R at his disposal, he looks to be a favorite to defend his title.

However, a lot of changes have taken place since the end of last season, which leads us to our topic of discussion: Our Top 10 Talking Points for the 2016 World Superbike Season. New riders have joined the series, the old guard have another year of experience under their belts, and a familiar manufacturer is making a return. What’s going to happen this season? Let’s talk about it.

We start the list with both a feel-good story and a bit of a downer. First the bad news: Aprilia has stepped away from World Superbike as a factory team to focus its efforts on its MotoGP project in 2016. The good news is Dorna, the series organizers, have leased last year’s RSV4 RF machines and the Ioda Racing Team will campaign both bikes. It’s riders? The 2015 Superstock 1000 champ Lorenzo Savadori and Alex de Angelis.

If you’ll remember, de Angelis suffered a horrific crash during practice at the Japanese MotoGP race at Motegi in which he was put into a medically-induced coma. Thankfully, de Angelis has recovered and is set to tackle racing again, albeit in a new series. Don’t expect big things from him as he’s still a bit rusty, his physical fitness is an unknown, and the Ioda Racing team won’t have much help from Aprilia. Instead, just be happy the guy’s still alive.

MV Agusta is in a strange place. Its World Supersport team, with riders Jules Cluzel and Lorenzo Zanetti, is consistently at the pointy end of the field with the three-cylinder 675cc F3. However fortunes aren’t quite the same for Leon Camier, the sole rider aboard the team’s F4RC Superbike. Camier has been praised for his abilities as a test rider to help develop the F4, but still, he’s been languishing at mid pack. The new year sees Forward Racing, which won the MotoGP Open class in 2014, take over racing operations for both Superbike and Supersport teams which will hopefully allow the factory to focus on development. If this partnership works out, look for Camier to dice closer to the front as the year goes on.

Nobody can accuse Ducati rider Davide Giugliano of not trying. The Italian is famous for his win-it-or-bin-it approach to racing, giving his all in an attempt to achieve the best position possible. But the downside to his approach is the frequency in which his ambition outweighs his talent. Last year Giugliano missed the first four races of the season due to fractured vertebrae from a pre-season crash. He came back strong with a third-place finish at the first race in Imola, only to tumble again hard at Laguna Seca, where he broke his vertebra again and missed the rest of the season.

With two serious injuries like that, what will Giugliano’s approach be for the upcoming season? Will he be more reserved or continue at full gas? The Ducati Panigale R consistently ran near the front with teammate Chaz Davies last year, and racers have a way of detaching their brains from the memories of past injuries, so if Davide finds himself in a competitive position it’s likely we’ll see the fierce competitor come out.

Yamaha’s back in the World Superbike paddock after last competing in 2011. The factory didn’t immediately enter its new YZF-R1 after its introduction last year, choosing instead to help support domestic superbike teams, all the while using the time to develop its WSBK challenger for 2016. A convincing victory in the Suzuka 8-Hour race last year has set the bar high for Yamaha’s WSBK effort this year, and with quality riders like Alex Lowes and 2014 champion Sylvain Guintoli, if the R1 fails to meet expectations it won’t be from a lack of talent. Expect the R1 riders to find their feet at the early stages of the season and hit their stride at the midway point.

BMW no longer has a factory-backed team in WSBK, but that doesn’t mean the S1000RR isn’t a potent machine to be on. For 2016, Althea BMW and Milwaukee BMW will campaign the S1000RR with support from BMW. Further, each team is fielding talented riders; Althea with former IDM Superbike champion Markus Reiterberger and two-time CEV Moto2 champ Jordi Torres. Meanwhile, Milwaukee is bringing reigning British Superbike champ Josh Brookes back to the world stage and moving Moto2 race winner Karel Abraham to the WSBK paddock as well. Look for any of these four to deliver surprises this season.

While everybody’s happy to see Nicky Hayden in the World Supebike paddock, nobody is expecting much out of him on the old and tired Honda CBR1000RR (a.k.a. Fireblade for our international readers). This is a good situation to be in if you ask me. Nicky’s talent isn’t in doubt, so poor results will be blamed primarily on the bike (assuming of course Nicky’s teammate, Michael van der Mark, also has poor finishes), and good results will be down to Hayden’s determination.

Continuing that theme, I’ll go ahead and put this out there: Nicky Hayden is going to set pole position at his home round: Laguna Seca – the only U.S. stop on the calendar. We saw what he did there during the early years of his MotoGP career, so why not expand that to his WSBK career, too. Winning the race is out of the question (I’m not completely delusional), but I think he’ll be able to muster one banzai lap to please the home crowd.

Let’s not kid ourselves here. Jon Rea dominated last season, his first on the Kawasaki. It makes you wonder what could have been had he not spent so much time on that Honda. That being said, the ZX-10R is heavily updated for 2016 and JR65 is in the prime of his career. Really, the only threat I can see to his title is the man across the garage from him, Tom Sykes. The 2013 champ still has the fire underneath him and is more than capable of going toe-to-toe with Rea. My prediction is the 2016 season will be fought between Rea, Sykes, and Davies, with Rea adding “Back-to-Back Champion” to his resume.