The MOTUL FIM Superbike World Championship heads to the Circuito Estoril for the 2020 season finale. The WorldSBK paddock heads back to the Portuguese track for the first time since 1993. The Pirelli Estoril Round will host the final fight for the WorldSBK title and promises to be another breathtaking event.
Get ready for the Pirelli Estoril Round with ten headlining stats ahead of the weekend’s commencement.
1. With a 59-point advantage and 62 maximum points available, Jonathan Rea needs just three points in three races to claim his 6th World Championship.
2. In Race 2 Leon Haslam will start his 100th race for Honda. Only three riders so far have started more than 100 races with the Japanese manufacturer: Aaron Slight (163), Jonathan Rea (140), Colin Edwards (127).
3. At his next start, Leon Haslam will equal Frankie Chili in fifth in the all-time records for WorldSBK races, 276.
4. Jonathan Rea has scored 99 wins so far: that is 40 clear of his best rival, Carl Fogarty. At Estoril he will have the second chance to score the iconic milestone of 100 wins: he missed the first time, finishing fourth in Race 2 in Magny Cours.
5. If Rea scores a front row in Superpole, he will equal the all-time record sequence of 17 straight front rows, recorded by Scott Russell from Brands Hatch 1993 to Albacete 1994. At the time though, the front row was composed by four riders and, under current rules, Russell’s string would have stopped after 11 races. Another striking aspect of Rea’s excellent form in qualifying is that he never missed a top ten spot since the 2011 Nurbugring weekend.
6. For the first time in seven years (2013: Jerez) the WorldSBK season finishes in Europe.
7. Estoril is back on the WorldSBK calendar after a gap of 26 years. This is a new record: in 2013, Jerez returned to the calendar after a 22-year wait.
8. Four winners in the four races held here: Davide Tardozzi, Stephane Mertens for Bimota; Fabrizio Pirovano for Yamaha and Carl Fogarty for Ducati.
9. The record for podiums by a manufacturer here is four, scored by Bimota; Kawasaki follows at three; Ducati and Yamaha at two; Honda one.
10. Three riders were able to climb on the podium twice, the track record here: Davide Tardozzi, Stéphane Mertens and Fabrizio Pirovano.
