Month: May 2018

Reale Avintia Racing MotoGP

After crashing heavily during the MotoGP tests at the Barcelona-Catalunya circuito on Wednesday, Reale Avintia Racing rider Tito Rabat spent one night at the University Hospital Quiron Dexeus in Barcelona, where MotoGP Medical Director Dr. Ángel Charte, MotoGP traumatologist Dr. Xavier Mir and internal specialist Dr. Jordi Robert took the best possible care of the 28-year-old. On Thursday morning, Rabat received the all-clear to leave the hospital and set himself the goal to race at the upcoming round at Mugello next week, despite a left-arm injury.

In an ultrasound test, Rabat was diagnosed with a muscle rupture of three centimetres in length. Dr. Xavier Mir and his team decided that surgery was not necessary and just immobilised Rabat’s left arm. Tito will now return to his house at Valencia, where he will undergo sessions of cold therapy in order to speed up the recovery of the muscular tissue over the next days.

Rabat will return to Barcelona on Tuesday next week for another ultrasound check. The doctors are then going to decide if his participation at the Italian Grand Prix will be possible or not. Rabat wants to ride his Ducati at Mugello at all cost. Even though the final answer will only be given next week, everybody in the team is convinced that Rabat is going to reach his goal.

“I was released from hospital already. My treatment couldn’t have been better, at the circuit as well as at the Dexeus clinic, where Dr. Charte and Dr. Mir gave me the best care imaginable. Yesterday we thought it would be an almost impossible task to race at Mugello, because it looked as if I needed an operation. But this morning, we made some more checks and decided to simply leave the arm in a cast for a week. Next week, we will check on the injury again. This year has been good for us so far, we have been very competitive, and this is why we want to try everything possible to get back into shape and be able to ride at Mugello. I want to thank everybody for the tremendous help and support I received since this crash”.

Reale Avintia Racing– Test MotoGP – Circuit Barcelona-Catalunya

Reale Avintia Racing rider, Tito Rabat, suffered a big crash this morning during MotoGP testing session at Barcelona-Catalunya Circuit. It was only the third exit for the 2014 Moto2 World Champion when he lost control of his Ducati in the last corner of the Catalan circuit. It was a big tumble. The bike was on fire and the rider immediately felt a bog pain on his left arm.

After the first medical checks at the circuit medical centre, Tito Rabat was transferred by ambulance to Quiron Dexeus Hospital for further examinations carried out by Dr. Xavier Mir’s team.

He has had an MRI and a 3D CT Scan of the left elbow and the following injuries have been diagnosed:
Muscle rupture grade 3 of fingers deep flexor.
Muscle rupture grade 2 of the carpal ulnar flexor.
Contusion in the ulnar nerve.
Bone edema in the epitroclea or olecranon.

He will undergo more tests tomorrow to decide the treatment to be followed and the recovery time.

Rabat has already informed team members that he wants to be in Mugello within nine days. Dr. Mir will decide if it is feasible.

Reale Avintia Racing– GP of France – Le Mans

Reale Avintia Racing team leaves France without reward. Until Sunday, the weekend had been very positive for Tito Rabat, moving straight to Q2 and qualifying eleventh on the grid. The Spaniard had a great start in the race and was in the top ten on the first lap, behind his compatriots Pedrosa and Rins. Tito felt he was strong, but crashed on the second lap when he tried to overtake both of them. Rabat picked his bike up and continued the race, but something was not working well and he was forced to retire on lap eleven.

His teammate Xavier Simeon finished the race, but with a lot of pain in his right forearm. It was a shame for the Belgian rider who was very comfortable with his bike and had been able to put up a fight with some rivals during the first few laps.

This week he will consult Dr. Xavier Mir at the Hospital Universitari Quiron Dexeus, and then a decision will be made if surgery is necessary.

The Reale Avintia Racing team now heads to Barcelona for a one day Michelin tire test on Tuesday. The track has been completely resurfaced and it has a revised layout.

“It is a shame, because I struggled during the whole race and I was hardly able to ride the bike. After five or six laps, the pain in my right arm was too much and it is a pity because in the warm up this morning we found something on the set-up that helped me a lot. I was really comfortable and during the first few laps, I was able to attack and battled within a group. But then I had this problem in my forearm and I was counting down the laps until the end. We have to find a solution to this issue for the rest of the season, because we improved the bike and we want to continue on our way up.”

“This time I had a good start, the first lap was strong, I gained one place and my feeling with the bike was perfect. I felt so strong that I wanted to overtake Dani and Rins as soon as possible. Instead of thinking and be patient, I just wanted to pass them. They went long in one turn and I tried, but in the next corner I changed my lines to defend my position, lost the front and crashed. I want to say sorry to the team because I had a great bike today and a good opportunity for a top ten finish. But I’ve screwed up.”

Reale Avintia Racing– GP of France – Le Mans

Tito Rabat did a superb job on Saturday morning, when he improved his lap times in FP3 enough to make a straight move to Q2 for the second time this season. In the afternoon, he showed a strong pace with the bike in race configuration and improved his lap time once again in Q2. Finally, he was 11^th with a best lap of 1’32.049, which was a great result for Reale Avintia Racing team today and showed Rabat’s big potential for this race.

Xavier Simeon feels more and more comfortable aboard his Ducati and was satisfied with his progress, even though he expected to be a little higher up than in 23^rd place in qualifying. Nevertheless, he shares Rabat’s optimism for the race and is sure to be able to improve further on Sunday.

Incredibly, the weather forecast remains sunny and warm for the race in Le Mans.

“It’s been a great weekend so far and I’m very happy because we are always in positions close to the front. We qualified for Q2 for the first time without help from another rider. But it’s true that I was following Andrea Dovizioso in Q2. In the end, I was not able to improve a lot. But with a good start, the race should also be good.”

“Today was slightly better than yesterday and I’m happy for that. In qualifying, when I was improving my lap time, the red flag came out. The only positive thing about today is that I was the best rider on a Ducati GP16. The gap to the fastest riders is bigger than in Jerez, and this is not positive. Tomorrow I hope to be focussed and be more consistent during the race to get more experience. I will do my best.”

MotoGP French GP – Le Mans

The first day of practice for the French Grand Prix went very well for the riders of Team Reale Avintia Racing.

Tito Rabat was, once again, very strong in terms of race pace and finished in twelfth position in both free practice sessions. Once again, it was apparent how competitive and hard-fought the MotoGP category is, with the 16 fastest riders separated by just nine tenths of a second. On Saturday, Rabat hopes to improve a bit more and to make a direct move to Q2.

For team-mate Xavier Simeon, the Le Mans circuit felt like a new race track. The MotoGP rookie improved his lap times every time he took to the track, but hasn’t found the best set-up for the “stop and go” characteristics of this race track yet. The Belgian rider also hopes to make a step forward on Saturday and aims at improving his position on the starting grid for the race on Sunday.

“We did a good job and scored twelfth place in the morning, s result that we were able to confirm in the afternoon. The best part was that we were able to improve our race pace and the feeling with the bike. Once again, the times are very close together. We are in twelfth place, but only six tenths of a second behind the fastest guy on the track. We are sure about our set-up and also made up our minds about the right tyre choice for the race. Tomorrow we will pull all stops for a good grid position, even though our focus remains on the race on Sunday, like always. We still need to improve on our speed for one single hot lap, but we are working on this and we’ll see what we can do tomorrow.”

“This first day at Le Mans was like the first day at school for me. Like at the last race at Austin, it was tough to go out on a track where I never rode a MotoGP bike before. It took me some times to set my reference points and to find the right lines with this motorcycle. Al things considered, we made a good step in the right direction and we improved every time I went out on the track. I still can’t push hard enough at the corner entries and I don’t pick up the bike early enough, which is why I cover more distance than the others and lose a bit. But we are analysing every detail in order to do much better on Saturday.”