SuperBike Magazine September 2020

26 SuperBike
KTM’s first
ever MotoGP
winner’s
trophy
The passion inside this
garage is unmatched!
took the combination of more time
on the bike, some hard work and a
revolutionary new KTM RC16 to deliver
Brno’s stunning rookie result.
“When I did the first tests at the end
of last year I was last in both, and I
think it gave me some extra fire to
go into the off season and figure out
this MotoGP thing. When we came
back to Malaysia, I made a good step
forward and when everything got cut
in Qatar I used the months off to my
advantage.
“When I first rode the bike at the
end of last year I thought ‘oh my
goodness, I’ve got some work to do’
because it was so hard to ride. Then
I climbed on the new bike in Malaysia
and it was another world. It felt
so much more natural and easier to
ride than the old one.”
That hard work was needed throughout
the Brno weekend too, though.
Finding the going tough again on the
opening day on Friday, it took all the
skills of his veteran team to find how
to make Binder comfortable on the
bike.
However, with a hugely experienced
team around him, some of whom
played a pivotal role in taking Nicky
Hayden to the 2006 MotoGP world
championship at Repsol Honda,
Binder says they were able to comfortably
steer him through it.
“On Friday we were in a completely
different boat and I could barely
touch the throttle without feeling like
I was going to get thrown into the air,
but on Friday night the guys did their
homework. When we left the track I
spoke with my crew chief and Mike
and they said ‘don’t worry, we’ll sort
it out’ and they were right.
“Already from FP3 the bike felt so
much more stable and just really
good. It comes a lot from the
amazing package that the guys put
together - the bike is insane. I’ve told
them since the start, this isn’t bad
eh? I can definitely see places where
we have a big advantage over the
others and it paid off in the race.
“We understood really well going
into the race what we had to do to
get to the end, and I have an amazing
team behind me who came up with
an insane strategy and I couldn’t believe
when I managed to get into first
place. I thought ‘gosh, I’m leading a
MotoGP race,’ and I was even more
surprised when I saw a gap start to
Pit Beirer congratulating the team while Brad was
being drowned in media interviews