Mahias Maintains Championship Lead in Assen

Race

GRT Yamaha Official WorldSSP Team's Lucas Mahias leaves Round 4 of the 2018 Supersport World Championship at Assen still leading the overall standings after a strong ride to fourth, although he was disappointed not to be able to fight for the race win on Sunday.

Mahias struggled to find the perfect setup in Aragon and, unfortunately, he suffered from a similar issue throughout the weekend in Assen. Starting from the middle of the front row, the reigning WorldSSP Champion led in the early stages of the race but was riding on the absolute limit for the entire 18 laps. He fought hard in the leading group and battled all the way to the line with some sensational riding. In a dramatic finish, it looked like he might be on the podium but he ended up missing out in the sprint to the line and finished in fourth, just 0.341s behind the winner. Despite being disappointed on missing out on the podium for the second consecutive race, the 29-year-old French rider leaves the TT Circuit Assen still leading the overall championship with 71 points, although his lead has now been reduced to one-point heading into Round 5 at Imola.

The GRT Yamaha Official WorldSSP Team now head to a private test at Brno later in the week, before it is time to set their sights on Round 4 of the WorldSSP Championship at Imola on the 11th-13th May. Check out the full WorldSSP race results from Assen.

Lucas Mahias

GRT Yamaha Official WorldSSP Team - 4th - 0.341s

"It has been a really, really difficult weekend for me. I am a little bit sad right now because fourth is not the position I wanted to finish the race. This is the second race in a row I have missed the podium and, for sure, I have the pace to fight for the podium but we just can't get the bike set up perfectly at the moment. In Aragon, we had similar issues and I seem to be losing out to the others on the straight, so now we must try to understand the problem. I pushed as hard as I could in what was a difficult race but, honestly, fourth was the best I could do today, it was impossible to get on the podium as it was like 18 qualification laps for me. I was pushing right on the limit every lap, which made it very difficult. My teammate Caricasulo had the same issue, he was pushing very hard in the race to try and stay in the podium fight and crashed. For me, it is not the end of the world as I am still leading the championship. I didn't make any mistakes and I genuinely think fourth was the best I could do. We will work really hard at the test in Brno to try and understand this issue and in the time before Imola, we will try and find a solution. I would like to thank my team for all their hard work this weekend. We improved in every session and the chassis is now set up perfectly. This is the reason I finished fourth, because of the excellent work from my team, so now I will focus on being able to fight for the win in Imola."

Filippo Conti

GRT Yamaha Official WorldSSP Team Manager

"It was a very exciting race with lots of drama. We just missed out on the podium with Lucas but we managed to close the gap to the guys at the front over the course of the weekend. I am not very satisfied with this race because I know that we have the potential to be fighting for the victory with both riders. We struggled really to find the right setup for our riders over the weekend and while we managed to improve in each session, it wasn't enough to win the race. Now we have the test at Brno to work on both riders setting's and hopefully, we can be back fighting for the race win in Imola."

Write up and image provided by Yamaha