The 2024 season debut

We are days removed from a top-ten finish by Tytlers Cycle Racing’s Stefano Mesa aboard the Energica Eva Ribelle RS KCC in the second Super Hooligan race at Daytona, Round One of the season. The experienced and fast Colombian rider managed to significantly improve his lap-times compared to a year ago, but so did all the other main competitors.

The Daytona International Speedway – hosting the opening event of the year – is unlike anything else on a FIM-sanctioned championship calendar: in the MotoAmerica configuration it has a 3.51-mile (5.65 km) tri-oval course with infield curves.  The seemingly endless straights (the front is 1,200 meters long and the “superstretch” is 910 meters)  allow for a panoramic view from the grandstands.  But it is the dramatic 31° high banking, originally designed for NASCAR, that is particularly intimidating to tackle on a motorcycle. Is it an easy track for electric? Perhaps not.

Motorcycle racing is the ultimate expression of competition: it is filled with adrenaline, excitement, challenges, joys and disappointment, and you hardly know which ones you are going to get on each occasion. A small technical issue, such as the one that prevented Mesa from finishing Race One, can also unfortunately happen.

Race 2 Link (YouTube)

Last year – Sporting the PETRONAS iona colours

The second event of the season for the 2023 Super Hooligan National Championship took place at The Ridge Motorsports Park, with Tytlers Cycle Racing’s Stefano Mesa crossing the line in sixth place at the end of the seven-lap, second race of the weekend, aboard the Kit Corsa Clienti-equipped Energica Eva Ribelle RS sporting the new, striking PETRONAS iona colours for the first time. However, both the first and second placed Indian motorcycles and their riders were disqualified due to a technical breach, leaving Mesa in fourth position.

Mesa was able to maintain his position at the start as the Super Hooligan field entered the first chicane and maintained a solid pace throughout the encounter, while keeping seventh-place rider AJ Peaslee (riding an ICE-powered KTM machine) at bay right up to the chequered flag. He did so by using the rear brake to back into the corner – all without having the use of the clutch.

Race one saw Mesa crossing the line in seventh place after starting from the back of the grid – dramatically cutting “like a knife through butter” (as one of the race announcers exclaimed) as he rapidly made his way up to eighth position and then gained one more place just before the chequered flag. He was able to make his final move on Peaslee in part because the latter – by his own words – had a hard time hearing him coming through!

Race 1 Link Race 2 Link (YouTube)

Last Year – The Holeshot

The third event of the season took place at the WeatherTech Laguna Seca Raceway in Northern California. This was another opportunity to shine for the Kit-Corsa-Clienti-equipped Energica Eva Ribelle RS, which in the capable hands of the 30-year-old Colombian rider Stefano wrote a new chapter in the history of motorcycling, as Roland Sands himself stated on commentary: “The first EV ever in the world to lead a race against ICE machinery”. Mesa exploited the immense torque of the Energica streetfighter machine to bend space and time and enter Turn One ahead of the rest of the field in Race One for a much-awaited holeshot.

But it was Race Two that proved how the rider and the technical package are gelling together, as Mesa showed a whole different pace on Sunday and set his fastest lap in 1:31.272secs, the new outright fastest lap-time for an electric motorcycle at the iconic Laguna Seca Raceway – a recordunbeaten for twelve long years, despite numerous attempts since to crack it.

This is an impressive achievement considering the recently resurfaced track at Laguna Seca, which throughout the race weekend slowed competitors down compared to the years before.

The previous lap record held strong since 2011, when Steve Rapp rode the Mission R prototype race bike of the now-defunct Mission Motors during a qualifying session before the all-electric TTXGP race.

The deliberate objective at that time for Mission was to set the quickest time possible for just a single lap to make a record that would be hard for anyone else to match. The result was an incredible 1’31.376secs utilizing a full power qualifying setting. By contrast, Rapp’s fastest lap during the TTXGP race that weekend was 1’33.194, roughly two seconds slower.

Race 1 Link Race 2 Link (YouTube)

Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course is a comprehensive motorsports facility in Lexington, Ohio, which sits on 380 acres and features a permanent road racing circuit with two primary race track configurations: 2.4 miles and 15-turns or 2.258 miles and 13-turns. Mid-Ohio hosts a number of racing series such as IndyCar, the IMSA WeatherTech Sportscar Championship, and the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series, along with other club events such as SCCA and the National Auto Sport Association. 

The track was the brainchild of Les Griebling, who convinced a number of friends from the local business community to invest in a road course for weekend sportscar racing. A few hundred acres of pasture in northwest Morrow County were quickly identified as a suitable site and ground was broken in 1961. By the following year, a challenging course designed by Griebling was ready for action. 

By following the contours of the land, a series of twisting and plunging corners was created, linked by a fast kinked back straight. Two signature corners – the Keyhole and the the Carousel – provide additional challenges for the competitors. The original course was mildly modified earlier in 1963 to address concerns that it was too slow. Oak Tree Bend (which, as its name suggests, wound around an oak tree) was removed and the Thunder Valley section added in its place. Some small traces of tarmac from the original bend still remain within the infield.

Last Year – The Podium

Tytlers Cycle Racing’s Stefano Mesa rode the Energica Eva Ribelle RS (equipped with the Kit Corsa Clienti) to the second place of the podium in a series almost exclusively made of ICE motorcycles.

The Circuit of The Americas, also known as CoTA, is a long track, 3.426 miles, even longer than Daytona, with 20 corners. And it was hot there, very hot: 39°C in the air (102°F) and a lot more on the asphalt. What on paper could technically hold an electric motorcycle back, did not: Stefano got off to an amazing start into second and then third place, and then held his own until a red flag forced him back to the pits; he did even better as soon as the action resumed, staying in podium contention and making the most of the incredible opportunity.

The signs were all there: despite being his first time racing at CoTA, Mesa seemed to enjoy the track from practice already, and then Qualifying 1 turned into a fifth place on the grid. The situation was under control, so much so that both team and riders agreed to sit out Qualifying 2 in order to preserve the battery for the afternoon’s race, knowing that it would be scorching hot out there under the Texan late summer sun. But how would the package fare on the full race distance? That was the answer only the ultimate trial could have given.

The start saw Mesa adeptly avoiding McWilliams as the latter struggled to get the bike off the line (the veteran had another theory about it, but never mind), while the Colombian used all the torque (a lot of torque!) available to still gain a couple of places before reaching the top of the hill and diving into the slow hairpin that Turn 1 is.

Mesa fought hard and was very aggressive on the brakes, making life difficult for Cory West who eventually high-sided out of the encounter. The same fate happened near the end to McWilliams after fighting a long and heated battle with teammate O’Hara. This opened the door to an unexpected promotion from third to second for Mesa, who ecstatically raised his fist in the air as he crossed the finish line in front of an over-the-moon crew, joined this time around by Energica’s CTO Giampiero Testoni and the #EnergicaOwners who truthfully had no better way to celebrate the 2023 Energica Week.

Race 1 Link Race 2 Link (YouTube)