After a good Bol d’Or in terms of performance but disappointing in terms of results, it was important for Greg and the Yamaha Maco Racing time to come back from Spain with a good result.
Directly, the bike is really competitive, and the average of the 3 riders puts the Team in 7th position for the start.
Greg takes a really good start and is in 4th position during the five first laps of the race. YART and Honda TT Legends overtake him, but he rides on a really good pace and takes a comfortable advantage to the direct opponents. Jason Pridmore (USA) makes the second run and Gregg Black (GB) the third, increasing the gap. After Greg’s second run, the second private bike has almost 1 lap delay on Maco Racing’s bike.
At the front of the race, the Yamaha Austria Racing Team runs out of fuel and it allows Greg and his team mates to reduce the gap, but not enough to overtake them. The crash of the TT Legends one hour before the chequered flag allows them to finish 5th.
Greg JUNOD was very happy after his Spanish week-end : « This year, compared to last year, the factory teams have much less crashes or technical problems. Without this, it is difficult to beat them, even if we reduced the gap. If we look at the race pace, we are not so far, and during the night, I did more or less the same lap times than the to teams. I am really happy with my race pace, I am enjoying a lot riding this Yamaha. After my last 1 hour run, the Team decided that I made one more hour to finish the race in order to keep the YART under pressure as they had only 1 lap advantage on us. We couldn’t overtake them, but they had no opportunity to rest. Now, if we look at the private teams only, we finish first with more or less 2.5 laps advantage on the second one, which means we are working very well. »
