Adrian Huertas made his debut on MOTUL FIM Superbike World Championship machinery on Tuesday during the MotorLand Aragon test and he was quickly up to speed on the ZX-10RR as he rode with the Kawasaki Racing Team WorldSBK squad. The Spaniard posted a 1’51.044s in the afternoon session to move into the top three briefly before being overhauled by his competitors but he finished as the lead Kawasaki rider as he took sixth place overall.
Huertas was one of the first riders to hit the track when the green flags waved in the morning, and he completed 50 laps in the first four-hour part of the day. This was the second highest in that session, with only Championship leader Alvaro Bautista (Aruba.it Racing – Ducati) and Tetsuta Nagashima (Team HRC) completing more, with 53 and 54 respectively. The #99’s best time in the morning was a 1’52.502s which put him last in the classification but less than two tenths behind Florian Marino, who was also testing for KRT.
In the afternoon, the WorldSSP star immediately improved his time by half-a-second before he found even more time right at the end of his day. He moved into second place after posting a 1’51.044s but, with his day ending earlier than other riders, was demoted to sixth when several other riders found time at the end of the day. In total, the debutant racked up 79 laps on the ZX-10RR and finished around six tenths slower than Michael Ruben Rinaldi’s (Aruba.it Racing – Ducati) best time of 1’50.388s. Although a like-for-like comparison isn’t available due to differing conditions and several other variables, his lap time would have put him 19th on the grid in last year’s Aragon Round with two Kawasaki riders behind him.
Reacting to his first day on World Superbike machinery, Huertas said: “It was amazing. I want to thank Kawasaki for the opportunity because it was a really helpful test for me to understand how to ride the bike. It was my first time on a 1000cc bike. It’s incredible. It has a lot of power and I already felt really good. I’m happy overall with the day. I expected to be fast because I consider myself to be a top rider, but I didn’t expect, on the first day at a test on the big bike, to be doing this.”
The 20-year-old is in his second season of WorldSSP action after moving to the Championship the year after he won the 2021 WorldSSP300 crown. In 2022, he finished 12th in the standings with a best finish of seventh but was immediately, and consistently, a points scorer and fighting for the lower end of the top ten. He has built on that in 2023 with two fourth-place finishes and been a regular inside the top five, although his first podium still eludes him. Despite not having a podium to his name yet, Huertas has impressed and was given the chance to test WorldSBK machinery for his 2021 title success and rapid improvement in WorldSSP.
When asked about his future, and whether this test could help him in his quest for WorldSSP success, the Madrid-born rider said: “This test could be really helpful for WorldSSP. Also, it’s an extra motivation and I think, when I go to Magny-Cours, I can fight for the victory. I’m not really looking at WorldSBK for 2024. I’m just focused on World Supersport. I enjoyed the test which was a prize for winning the WorldSSP300 title and for improvement I’m making in WorldSSP.”
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Source: WorldSBK.com