Following the announcement ahead of the 2018 season that Team Grillini will be racing with Suzuki, they have now announced their second rider for 2018, 17 year old Gabriele Ruiu.

Joining the team from Donington Park in May onwards, the young Italian has had experience with the GSX-R1000 Suzuki following some races in the Italian championships.

Despite being unable to compete with the team for the opening five rounds of the season, he will travel with the Grillini squad in order to understand how the team works and to develop a strong relationship with his new team.

Ruiu is delighted at the news: "I want to thank Team Manager Andrea Grillini for putting his trust in my talent. It is a great opportunity and an important responsibility to join WorldSBK, so I have to prepare the season with the utmost commitment and determination to give my best."

"I met Gabriele not long time ago," adds Team Manager Andrea Grillini. “He is very young and, in addition to a great talent, he really wants to do well. It will be an amazing experience for him and the whole team will work to get him to his first race in the WorldSBK in the best conditions."

"Gabriele has already raced with a GSX-R1000 Suzuki in Stock 1000 and in SBK in the Italian Championship with good results, and this will help him to gain confidence with our bike."

"Rules do not allow him to take start the championship immediately because of his age, but he will train and follow the Team during the first five races to debut on the Donington track.”

The team are set to announce their second rider for the opening rounds of the season, in order to run both bikes throughout the first five rounds.

source: worldsbk.com

Following a strong weekend in the final round of the 2017 season at Losail International Circuit, Roberto Rolfo has secured a full time ride with Team Grillini in the WorldSBK Championship for next season.

Starting his season in the World Supersport Championship, Rolfo stepped into the Grillini Team for the final race of the WorldSBK season and was able to score points in both races.

The Italians last appearance in the class was back in 2011 with Kawasaki after four full seasons, in which he was able to take a top eight world championship finish. As the Grillini Team make the switch to Suzuki for next season, there will be a big challenge ahead but it’s one the new partnership are looking forward to.

"I am very happy to be back in WorldSBK," begins Rolfo. "I am very motivated to race on a Suzuki, a bike that I have always followed but I have never had the chance to try. "

"After Qatar's positive experience, I thank Andrea Grillini for this opportunity. During the last race of the 2017 season, I was feeling very positive with a desire to do well, and that is very important to me – so I can start the next season in the best way."

"I can’t wait to get on the bike and find the right chemistry with the team! Meanwhile I have started my training to be ready and in the best shape, for the first round in February!" He added

Andrea Grillini, team manager adds: “I have known Roberto for a long time, but in Qatar we immediately found a great feeling and we started talking about a possible agreement for 2018."

"He found the new project with Suzuki interesting and like me, he thinks that we can do well. I need a serious person with experience to develop a bike, that at the moment is not present in WorldSBK and to me he perfectly embodies this figure. I'm really happy to have come to an agreement with him.”

source: worldsbk.com

The Superbike Commission composed of Messrs Rezsö Bulcsu (FIM CCR Director), Takanao Tsubouchi (MSMA Representative), Steve Aeschlimann, Fabio Muner, Charles Hennekam, Scott Smart and Paul Duparc (FIM), in the presence of Messrs Daniel Carrera (WorldSBK Executive Director), Gregorio Lavilla (WorldSBK Sporting Department Director), in a meeting held in the FIM Headquarters in Mies, on 29 November, made the following changes for the 2018 Superbike & FIM Supersport World Championships Regulations:            

Sporting and Disciplinary Regulations

The time schedule of practices sessions and warm ups (time and duration) has been reviewed. Slight changes have been carried out to the Sporting rules mainly to clarify the Practice restrictions and the starting procedure.

It was also clarified that any rider, having taken part in the qualifying practices (WorldSBK and WorldSSP) who failed to achieve a qualifying time within 107% of the fastest rider of his class, will start the race from the back of the grid.

A start delay with a “quick start” procedure has been put in force.

Taking into consideration that the penalty points were withdrawn from the list of penalties, a clarification and the definition of the penalties have been adopted.

Technical Regulations

The Superbike Commission approved a number of clarifications and editorials with regards to the earlier introduced ‘REV limiter’, ‘Balancing calculator’ and the ‘Concession parts’ (with price capping, in order to provide availability to all parts and for all teams along with controlled pricing).

The use of aerodynamic components (e.g. ‘wings’), would only be permitted if fitted on the homologated model sold in the Europe, Japan and North America.

Furthermore, it was agreed that electronic suspension could not be used (even if present on the homologated model).

source: worldsbk.com

Finishing second fastest on the second day of their final test of the year, Alex Lowe had a productive day around the Circuito de Jerez, praising his team for their hard work.

Returning to the circuit in which he had a solid weekend around this season, he began to work through their 2018 plan and notes some changes he has found with the 2018 regulations

. Working with the new rev limits for next season, the British rider comments that he has already began to adapt his riding to work around them, but is positive nonetheless.

With plenty more work on the cards on Friday, the British rider is hopeful of another strong day to end 2017 on a high. His lap time of 1.39.770 put him only 0.107s behind Melandri at the top, and he looks forward to a busy final day.

Lowes explained: “It’s going quite well, we worked really hard today and tried lots of different things. Obviously this is one of the main points of the test, to collect all the data to improve the bike over the winter."

"Already we have made a couple of steps forward and it’s going to be an interesting last day tomorrow. One of the biggest areas I am working on personally is corner entry, as this year I was forcing the bike on corner entry, so I’ve been finding a few solutions to help me, but as a team there’s been a lot of new parts but we’ve been working a lot."

"Today we used the new RPM, in this track there are a few corners where we need to make one extra gear shift up, so I had to get used to that and it will be interesting to see how this in on other circuits.”

Dutch team-mate Michael van der Mark has spent all his time out on track beginning to understand the new regulations with his YZR-R1, and has put in over 160 laps across the two days on track in Spain. His lap time of 1.40.199 put him in fifth position overall on track, and he is looking forward to his final day of 2017 on Friday.

Van der Mark explained his day: “So far I am really happy with the test, and we have been testing with the new regulations which for us have been quite positive, we are still working out what to do with the gearing but the first feeling is quite good for us."

"Next year we have many electronic updates, we are trying many new things and a different system, we have a lot to do and I am really happy with the pace so far, but we have a lot more to test on the last day. Which I am really happy about, it’s a good thing to have so many things to test and you can go away in the winter and think about what is better or not.”

Regarding the final day, he adds: “We are testing set ups from last year back to back, we just have to keep the new regulations and try different set ups. I look forward to tomorrow, it’s the last day of the year riding and I still enjoy it after so many laps.”