Benat Fernandez (Kove) saw his advantage cut to just three points over both Thompson and Salvador. After an entirely typical and endlessly chaotic second and final WorldSSP300 race, Fernandez won both the race and the championship, despite both Kawasaki title contenders mounting strong challenges in the 11-lap contest.

Despite not quite being able to take the final Riders’ Championship Kawasaki bids farewell to this series as the most successful WorldSSP300 manufacturer ever - and by some distance.

In Superpole Qualifying at Jerez, as ever held on Friday of race weekend, two Kawasaki Ninja 400 riders pushed themselves onto the front row. Thompson was second quickest, with Jose Manuel Osuna Saez (ZAPPAS Deza - Box77 Racing Kawasaki) third. Championship contender Salvador was fifth and Thompson’s team-mate Loris Veneman (MTM Kawasaki) sixth. Benat Fernandez was seventh.

Race One was held in glorious sunshine, and with the potential for the championship battle to change significantly. Before Race One, Thompson was ten points behind points leader Fernandez, with Salvador 22 points from the top spot. Even Yamaha rider Matteo Vannucci was not technically out of the championship fight, even if he was 46 points behind Fernandez.

It was all to play for in the opening race of this historic WorldSSP300 round, especially for the top four in the points table.

It started well for both Kawasaki’s final championship hopefuls, but at Turn Two early in the first attempted Race One contest, Thompson was suddenly out of contention, having crashed. He was way down the order after restarting.

A later three-rider crash in T2 suddenly brought out the red flags to stop the race, at just short of two-thirds race distance. Had it reached that stage, the race would have been called to a close, but there would prove to be a five-lap full restart.

During a quick restart procedure, Thompson was allowed to take part in the re-run race, having been a lap down but importantly back on track in the first attempted running of the race. Because of this, he was required to start from almost the back of the grid, in 26th place.

Despite having only five laps to try and push forward to keep his title hopes alive, Carter put in a great effort and got into the top ten as the final laps counted down. He would eventually finish eighth.

Near the end of the race, an incident in the exit of T1 saw Veneman and Fernandez run off track, stay upright through the gravel, and both get back onto the asphalt, if way down the field in each case.

Veneman was later penalised for irresponsible riding and finished down in 21st position, out of the points. Fernandez, still the championship leader, scored a single point for 15th place, after recovering from his off-track experience. 

In the first race itself, with Thompson scoring eight points for eighth place, the top-finishing Kawasaki rider was Salvador, one place and a tiny 0.019 seconds behind race winner Matteo Vannucci, the Superpole Qualifying ‘winner.’

Daniel Mogeda (Pons Motorsport Italika Racing Kawasaki) finished in third place, 0.248 seconds down on the winner.

The last two places in the top five of Race One were also filled by Kawasaki riders, with Antonio Torres (Team ProDina XCI Kawasaki) and Osuna Saez fourth and fifth, respectively. Such is the nature of WorldSSP300 that the top five riders were covered by just 0.513 seconds.

In terms of the championship, after Race One’s dramatic happenings, the championship fight had closed up significantly, with just one more race to go on Sunday. Fernandez had a three-point lead over both Thompson and Salvador. Just to add even more spice to the forthcoming Sunday mix, Vannucci’s win even kept him in the championship fight, some 22 points behind Fernandez, and with 25 points available for a race win.

Race Two began with an astonishing degree of tension filling the air. Despite his Race One misfortunes, and because of his fight through the field, Thompson started Race Two from pole position, having set the fastest lap of the Race One restart. Mogeda was thus third off the line, Vannucci fifth, Fernandez sixth, Veneman seventh and Salvador ninth.

With all the final title contenders and some proven race winners packed into the first few rows for the 11-lap Race Two, it was truly a championship decider.

From the start, the remaining contenders were in the hunt for a win. If any one of the top three contenders won the race, there would be no need for clever arithmetic to decide who would take the title. It would be the rider who won. The best way to win the crown would therefore be to win the race itself.

It was fitting in the end that the final WorldSSP300 race of all would be run at the classic Jerez venue, and under a hot autumnal sun once again.

The leading group was 15 riders strong, with no single hopeful able to make any kind of break to get away from the pack. Several tried, but with so many passing opportunities at Jerez, in fast or slow corners, the leading positions may have changed constantly, but the group stayed together.

After being run off track at one stage, Thompson was dropped from the front of the group and went down to 13th place. He timed his run back to the podium places well but would be swamped by other riders in the final left-hand curve and was forced to modify his final corner exit plan.

He crossed the line as part of one almost solid pack of riders but was later penalised to drop one position for exceeding track limits on the last lap. This left him sixth, in a race in which penalties were almost the norm rather than the exception.

Mogeda escaped any sanction and thus finished third, with Torres a penalised third.  Veneman, originally on the podium, was fifth in the revised race results.

Salvador’s attempt to win the final race and with it the championship ended up with the Spanish rider being penalised for irresponsible riding (rather than a less severe track limits transgression) and he was given a three-second penalty. Given that 15 riders finished within 1.890 seconds of the winner, this took him from almost the race winner to a final 16th position, meaning he did not quite score a point.

The upshot of all the last-lap barging and pushing, after another season full of combative and breathless action, is that Fernandez won the championship on his Kove machine, with a final 231 points to Thompson’s 213 and Salvador’s 203.

Garcia (unable to race in the finale after his race one crash) was eventually sixth with 140 points, tied on the same total as Torres. Daniel Mogeda was ninth in the final points table, Osuna Saez tenth, and Veneman - after just four rounds - was 11th.

In the Manufacturers’ Championship, which Kawasaki had already won before getting to Spain, the final points advantage was 80 over Yamaha and 108 over Kove.

Kawasaki’s Ninja 400 powered the top two squads of the year to the Team’s Championship title, with Team ProDina XCI on 343 points and MTM Kawasaki on 319.

The end of the nine-year span of the once experimental FIM Supersport 300 World Championship was conducted in full public view at Jerez, and it did not disappoint the neutral observer. As ever, it provided spectacle, close racing and more drama than could be imagined from machines with engines well under the displacement of WorldSSP or WorldSBK machinery.

Since the beginning of the WorldSSP300 championship, all those years ago in 2017, Kawasaki Ninja 300/400s have won 72 races. There have been 211 Kawasaki podium places, 59 fastest laps and 41 pole positions.
There have been five riders’ championships taken by Kawasaki competitors and seven Manufacturers’ championships have been secured. Kawasaki was the motive force behind the still unique phenomenon of an open FIM road racing World Championship being won by a woman, Ana Carrasco, in 2018.

WorldSSP300 will now make way for the larger capacity World Sportbike Championship in 2026, which will still be the introductory class for younger riders and new teams, and it will still have Kawasaki competitors right at its heart.

Rider Comments

Loris Veneman (MTM Kawasaki), stated: “The second race, in the beginning, was pretty good and I could lead quite a lot of laps but in the end I struggled a little bit with the slipstream to get into the right position for the corner after the long straight, so I messed up a little bit there and fell back. In the last lap I saw - a little too late that it was the last lap - I was not really prepared for it. I could still get on the podium - although eventually not. That was a bit strange but in the end I am quite happy with it and I cannot wait for next year.”

Carter Thompson (MTM Kawasaki), stated: “On Sunday we struggled a bit in the race but we still ended up second in the championship, so we have to be happy. The team did an unbelievable job all season. It was difficult but we still managed to get second. We cannot complain because that was not so bad - and we were the first Kawasaki in the points table.”

David Salvador (Team ProDina XCI Kawasaki), stated: “It was a very close first race, with a lot of overtaking, especially at the restart after the red flag. I'm satisfied with having scored as many points as possible, although I'm still a bit disappointed about the mistake exiting the final corner that cost me the win. I'm a bit angry about how it ended on Sunday, I'm sorry for what happened. As a rider, in a situation where you are fighting for a World Championship, I always have to give my best, and even today my head was only on winning. On the last lap I pushed to the limit, it was all or nothing because I wanted to win the championship. I didn't see the rider who then crashed, I just wanted to overtake him and my concentration was all on the exit of the corner. I am sorry for the incident and accept the decision of Race Direction, although I think it is important to understand that this was a decisive race, with a lot of tension and pressure. During the race I also suffered some contacts, but this is part of motorcycling. In the end I finished third, even in the World Championship, and I'm still proud of the work done.”

Antonio Torres (Team ProDina XCI Kawasaki), stated: “I'm really happy with the Race One result. It was an intense race; we gave it our all from the first lap and managed to consistently stay among the frontrunners, taking a valuable fourth place. The bike worked very well, and the feeling improved lap after lap, a sign of the great work we're doing together with the team. We finished the season in Jerez with a very good third place and I'm really happy with the result. It was an intense year, in which we worked hard and always gave our best. I am very grateful to the team for the commitment and dedication shown on every race weekend.”

Daniel Mogeda (Pons Motorsport Italika Racing Kawasaki), stated: “All the group is within one second of each other, maybe, and there can be 17 riders, or something like this. It is very difficult to manage in Race One, but I managed it and with two or three laps to go, I could go to the front of the group and then finish on the podium after the last corner. So I am very happy with that.”

Julio Garcia (ProDina Kawasaki Racing Sport), stated: “It was a race on Saturday where I felt much better than the last few, after my injury. Lap after lap, I was finding a good feeling and a good pace, but unfortunately, a collision with another rider caused me to crash.”

Steve Guttridge - KME Race Planning Manager, stated: “It was an exciting weekend to finish off the WorldSSP300 era. Two Kawasaki riders were in the fight right to the finish, and they ended up second and third in the championship. Kawasaki has won more titles and races in WorldSSP300 than any other manufacturer, and has been an enthusiastic supporter of the class from the start. This year, in the final year, Kawasaki has taken the Manufacturer’s Championship again. Prodina XCI and MTM finished 1-2 in the Team’s championship. It has been a successful journey in WorldSSP300, and we hope to have more success in the category that will replace it.”



                        #NinjaSpirit