Ryuichi Kiyonari

Ten Kate Honda Racing's Ryuichi Kiyonari has reluctantly been forced to withdraw from the final round of the 2009 World Superbike championship at Portimao in Portugal. The Japanese ace broke his right collarbone in race one at the previous round in Magny-Cours, France and returned home for an operation. It was the same collarbone that Kiyonari broke at the French circuit during a test last season. Despite a clamp keeping the bone stable, Kiyonari was in considerable pain during yesterday's opening free practice and qualifying sessions, when he set a time of 1'45.676s at the 4.59km Portimao circuit. After further consultation with medical staff ... Read Full Story

Ryuichi Kiyonari is looking forward to continuing the development of new suspension parts on his Ten Kate Honda Racing CBR1000RR Fireblade at this weekend's (4-6 September) 11th round World Superbike championship event at Nurburgring in Germany. The Japanese ace began using Ohlins suspension at the last round at Brno in the Czech Republic and enjoyed an improvement in his feeling on the bike in the second race there, despite finishing in 13th place. Kiyonari has tasted the podium champagne on two occasions this season, both at Monza, and the double British Superbike champion is seeking to visit the rostrum again before the end of ... Read Full Story

Ryuichi Kiyonari of the Ten Kate Honda Racing team is confident of improved results heading into this weekend's (24-26 July) 10th round World Superbike championship event at Brno in the Czech Republic. The Japanese rider has had an inconsistent string of results thus far in 2009, in spite of two podium finishes in round five at Monza in Italy, and is seeking improvement on his fifth and sixth place finishes at the 5.4km Brno circuit last year. Kiyonari completed a successful two-day test at Imola in Italy last week, when he was able to test fully the Ohlins suspension that the rest of his ... Read Full Story

Ryuichi Kiyonari insists on taking positives from his eighth round World Superbike championship encounters at Misano in Italy, in spite of disappointing results. Today's two races were won by American Ben Spies and Kiyonari's Ten Kate Honda team-mate, Jonathan Rea. In race one, Kiyonari gave the stricken Rea a lift back to the pits after the Northern Irishman's bike suffered fuelling problems on the sighting lap. However, his gesture resulted in a ride-through penalty for both riders. Kiyonari was unable to take his ride-through after a near-highside on the opening lap. Rea, who started from the back of the grid for a pit lane ... Read Full Story

Click the images below for bigger versions: In changeable weather conditions, Ryuichi Kiyonari set the eighth fastest time in today's Superpole sessions at Misano in Italy to secure a second row start for tomorrow's two eighth round World Superbike championship races. The Japanese ace had been running near the top of the leaderboard in all earlier practice sessions but opted to use his two allotted Pirelli qualifiers in the second Superpole session to ensure progression to the final eight-rider shoot out. Going out on a race tyre early in the final session, Kiyonari crashed unhurt at turn one on his first flying lap. As ... Read Full Story