Pata Yamaha’s Michael van der Mark has given his first thoughts on the YZF-R1 he’ll ride in the 2017 World Superbike Championship in an interview in Yamaha’s Insider e-magazine.
The Dutch rider stepped up to the Superbike class of the World Championship in 2015 having won the 2014 Supersport title with the Ten Kate Honda team. Remaining with the outfit for the following two seasons, van der Mark secured nine podium finishes and ended the 2016 campaign fourth overall.
Having been with Honda and Ten Kate for the entirety of his World Championship career, the Dutchman will join Paul Denning’s Pata Yamaha team alongside Alex Lowes next year. The former World Supersport Champion has completed two tests with the R1 already, ending the Jerez test seventh on the combined time sheets and a respectable three tenths of a second off of Lowes’ best time.
Van der Mark admitted that he and the team still have much to do before the season gets underway in Australia at the end of February, but is nonetheless already feeling happy on the bike and with his new surrounding.
“My first impressions were really good and straight out of the pits I felt happy with the bike,” he said. “At this early stage we still have a lot of work to do but I can already feel so much potential in the YZF-R1, which makes me even more motivated for the coming season.
“The team here is great; they have a lot of experience and work really hard,” he added. I think we can say that right from the start we all had a good feeling and working with the guys went perfect right from the beginning of the first test!”
Winter testing resumes at the end of January 20 at the Jerez Circuit in Spain, with the opening round of the 2017 season taking place just a few weeks later at Phillip Island in Australia.
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