Le Castellet. BMW Motorrad Motorsport had the perfect start to
the season finale of the 2023 FIM Endurance World Championship (FIM
EWC) at Le Castellet (FRA). In the extremely exciting two-part
qualifying for the 24-hour Bol d’Or race, the BMW Motorrad World
Endurance Team secured pole position with the #37 BMW M 1000 RR.
This marked an important first step for the team with riders Markus
Reiterberger (GER), Ilya Mikhalchik (UKR), and Jérémy Guarnoni (FRA)
in their quest for the championship title. In the Superstock class,
the Tecmas-MRP-BMW Racing Team will start from pole position with
the #9 BMW M 1000 RR. This team also has a chance at the title in
its category.
The BMW Motorrad World Endurance Team arrived at Le Castellet as
third in the overall standings, 38 points behind the leaders.
Accordingly, their first goal was to secure pole position, as it not
only provides the best starting position for the race but also earns
an additional five points. In the two-part qualification held on
Thursday and Friday, they achieved this with the best average time
from the individual sessions. The team’s fastest lap times were set by
Reiterberger (1:51.596 minutes) and Mikhalchik (1:51.721 minutes) in
the second part of qualifying on Friday morning.
In the Superstock class, the Tecmas-MRP-Racing Team entered the
finale as fourth overall with a 16-point deficit. In the qualifying
session, Kenny Foray (FRA) was the team’s fastest rider, ensuring that
the #9 BMW M 1000 RR was unbeatable.
The 86th edition of the Bol d’Or will kick off on Saturday, September
16th, at 15:00. The number of points awarded in the race will by
multiplied by a factor of 1.5. This means that the winning team will
receive 60 points, and there will be 49.5 points for second place and
42 points for third place. In addition, further points will be awarded
to the best teams in the interim standings after eight and 16 hours.
Quotes after qualifying.
Markus Reiterberger (#37 BMW M 1000 RR, BMW Motorrad World
Endurance Team: “Already yesterday, my lap time was very
good. I did that alone and today I tried to find the slipstream and
that helped me to get another few tenths. I want to say thank you to
the team. Our bike is incredibly fast and I think we are ready for the
race. Our plan for the 24-hour race is to go full attack. Our goal was
to get pole position and to win the race. This is what we have to do
to have a chance for the title.”
Werner Daemen, Teammanager BMW Motorrad World Endurance Team:
“It has been our plan to get pole position as we are pretty
far behind the two teams in front of us in the standings, so the only
chance to keep the championship open for us was to take pole position
and to get as many points as possible after eight hours, 16 hours and
24 hours. In our position we must give everything and maybe also risk
a little bit more than the other guys to try to win. The two teams in
front of us can try to manage the points more. But as we know from
last year, it is a long race here, not only for the riders but also
for the bikes. A lot can happen. We will see on Sunday at 15:00
o’clock if we are all there and I hope that we will be on the highest
step of the podium and then we will see what the others do.”
Kenny Foray (#9 BMW M 1000 RR, Tecmas-MRP-BMW Racing
Team): “I think that we have the same target as the #37 BMW M
1000 RR; we just need to win to take the title. It is a 24-hour race
and it’s really long. But the only objective is to win the race.”
