In Le Mans, France, the new year of the world championship of road motorcycle endurance races started over the weekend. The Slovak Maco Racing team, which entered its 22nd season in this championship, also presented itself at the start.
The Slovak team, which has raced Yamaha motorcycles throughout its career at the World Championships, has podiums and top 5 finishes to its credit, and was also the best privateer team in the series, finishing sixth overall.
He entered the 2024 season with similar goals. Martin Vugrinec from Croatia, Takeshi Ishizuka from Japan and Martin Choy from Bulgaria appeared as racers for the Maco Racing team in Le Mans, Austrian racer Max Melzer was the substitute. Already in the first qualification, Vugrinec experienced a difficult moment, he broke his leg when he fell, had to be taken to the hospital and was eliminated from the event. Ishizuka also experienced a fall in the qualification.
The Slovak team was in 26th position on the starting grid. After the start of the race, the team gradually worked their way into the second ten, but halfway through the 24-hour race, Melzer crashed and the motorcycle was damaged beyond repair. The race thus ended prematurely for the Slovak team.
Martin Kuzma, team owner:
“For the 2024 season, we deployed a new crew and a reserve rider. After the tests, everything looked ok, but as it happens in this sport, everything can change, and that’s exactly what happened to us this weekend. The conditions for racing were difficult, it was very cold and wet.
The plan was clearly given, to qualify in peace and concentrate on the race. The problem arose in the first qualification, when Martin Vugrinec lost his grip on some dirt on the track in his second outing, got injured and could not continue. The qualifying bike was repaired because we didn’t want to use the motorcycle race in qualifying. Martin Choy continued and then Takeshi Ishizuka, but as a result of the fall the bike stopped and he could not continue. In the second qualification, Takeshi had a fall right at the beginning and could not continue again. In the end, it was the 26th place at the start, which was not a problem.
We couldn’t find a reserve rider for the race who would have more experience from endurance races, so we used our Max. It was difficult for him, but the plan was to get long stints until the second day, where we wanted to go stints with Martin and Takashi, who were riding faster times. The pit stops were good, again they were 100 percent, we were among the fastest teams at the pit stops. Unfortunately, at three o’clock in the morning, when we were already waiting for the next pit stop, another crash occurred and forced us to withdraw from the race. So for the first time since 2018, we did not see the finish line of the Le Mans race. I wish Martin Vugrinc a speedy recovery. Our team immediately starts preparing for the next race of the world championship, the eight-hour race in Spa, Belgium. I thank our partners for their help and the fans for their support.”
