Race Report

Debut EWC win for the all-new Fireblade at Le Mans

F.C.C. TSR Honda France showed the endurance capability of the all-new CBR1000RR-R Fireblade SP in its debut outing in the FIM Endurance World Championship, winning the legendary 24 Heures Motos at Le Mans, completing 816 laps and holding the lead for the majority of the 24-hour race with Freddy Foray, Mike Di Meglio and Josh Hook.

Starting the race from fourth position yesterday (Saturday 29 August) in dry conditions, Di Meglio took the race lead on his second lap until the end of his first stint. The #5 Honda CBR1000RR-R Fireblade SP was in second place after the first pit stop just before the weather turned and rain fell across the Bugatti circuit. However, not fazed by the changing conditions, the team stormed back to regain the lead.

At the end of the first eight hours of the 43rd edition of the 24 Heures Motos, F.C.C. TSR Honda France were still holding on to first place and scored the 10 bonus points awarded after the first third of the race. The team spent the whole night at the front of the pack, maintaining the lead over their rivals, to collect a further 10-point bonus at the end of the 16th hour. During the night, Di Meglio even set the race lap record with 1’36.985.

The trio of riders did not make any mistakes during this picture-perfect race and eventually crossed the line taking the chequered flag to win the 24-hour race aboard the extremely reliable brand-new, Honda CBR1000RR-R Fireblade SP. The result sees the team collect valuable points which moves them into second position in the provisional FIM Endurance World Championship standings with a total of 87 points.

Freddy Foray, Josh Hook, Mike Di Meglio and the F.C.C. TSR Honda France team will now look forward to the last round of the 2019/2020 FIM-EWC Championship, which takes place on 26 September in Portugal, where they hope to win the title back.

Ewc_24_H_Motos_2020_Depart_

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5 FCC TSR Honda France, Hook Josh, Foray Freddy, Di Meglio Mike, Honda CBR 1000RR, Formula EWC

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Freddy Foray ⁵

When you look back, you realise that the Fireblade made its first steps and won the race today. I just want to say a big thank you to this team for achieving an incredible performance because at the start of the week we didn't know what to expect from a bike that started from scratch. Sharing this with the team and my teammates is fantastic too. I would like to congratulate Mike for riding really well and also Josh who was injured and made it through to the end. This is the second win we've shared here with the team and it's great. A few weeks ago we didn't even know if it would be possible to race because of the sanitary situation and today we are in Le Mans and we won the race, it's just magic!

F.C.C. TSR Honda France

Josh Hook ⁵

It was an unbelievable race! We headed in this weekend with the new bike, the team had only few months to prepare it and we arrived here and got the job done. The new Honda Fireblade SP is amazing, straight out of the box it’s already competitive and surprised us all, riders and team, because we went faster on that bike than on any other bike directly. We kept on improving the bike and we arrived in Le Mans with a bike that was able to win the race, and we knew that from the start. A massive thank you to the team and our partners that worked so hard to get this new bike up and running. They deserve this victory and I’m happy that Freddy, Mike and myself were able to do it!

F.C.C. TSR Honda France

Mike Di Meglio ⁵

It was a crazy race! Right from the start I thought that the race pace would be much faster, and as we were starting from a new machine I was ready to accept to let my rivals go. I made a good start and I was second behind Gregg Black, who I quickly overtook at the end of the first lap, and then I started to ride with my own pace. I was quite surprised to see that I was able to build up a gap so I calmed things down a bit during the first stint. When a few competitors started to make mistakes with the tricky conditions, we chose to stay focused on our pace. Then during the night, I started to understand how the bike worked and to have fun with it, and I set quite good lap times. The team did a really fantastic job on the new Fireblade SP, we trained as much as we could during the whole Covid period and we won in the end, that's great.

F.C.C. TSR Honda France

30 Aug 2020

24 Heures Motos

Circuit des 24 Heures, France

FIM EWC 2019-2020, Round 3

RACE

Sunday 30 Aug 2020, 10:14 UTC

#	Team	Constructor Constr.	Time/Gap	Laps
1	F.C.C. TSR Honda France	Honda		816
2	Webike SRC Kawasaki France Trickstar	Kawasaki	2 laps	814
3	Suzuki Endurance Racing Team	Suzuki	3 laps	813
4	YART - YAMAHA	Yamaha	5 laps	811
5	VRD Igol Pierret Experiences	Yamaha	17 laps	799
6	3ART Best of Bike	Yamaha	22 laps	794
7	Wójcik Racing Team	Yamaha	23 laps	793
8	GERT56 by GS Yuasa	BMW	30 laps	786
9	No Limits Motor Team	Suzuki	33 laps	783
10	Moto Ain	Yamaha	35 laps	781
11	Maco Racing	Yamaha	35 laps	781
12	Team 33 Coyote Louit Moto	Kawasaki	37 laps	779
13	Motobox Kremer Racing	Yamaha	42 laps	774
14	Team LRP Poland	BMW	46 laps	770
15	JMA Motos Action Bike	Suzuki	47 laps	769
16	OG Motorsport by Sarazin	Yamaha	50 laps	766
17	AM Moto Racing Competition	Kawasaki	51 laps	765
18	Slider Endurance	Yamaha	51 laps	765
19	Junior Team LMS Suzuki	Suzuki	60 laps	756
20	TATI TEAM BEAUJOLAIS RACING	Kawasaki	61 laps	755
21	Team Bolliger Switzerland	Kawasaki	61 laps	755
22	Falcon Racing Rennes Motos	Yamaha	62 laps	754
23	Dunlop Motors Events	Suzuki	70 laps	746
24	Energie Endurance 91	Kawasaki	75 laps	741
25	Le Mans 2 Roues	Aprilia	75 laps	741