What a close race that was. With just ten meters to go, it was still completely unclear who would win the first Supersport race of the day. In the end, it was Max Enderlein, who runs his own team, M32 Racing. He beat Thomas Gradinger by a mere 22 hundredths of a second.
“I realized that Thomas needed someone to race against today,” Enderlein laughed later. Former World Championship rider Gradinger had been leading for a long time and was pushing himself to the limit, while Enderlein clearly still had some reserves left. “Thomas was missing those last three-tenths of a second, so I took advantage of that.”
Gringer’s team manager, Thomas Eder, had wanted to bet that his driver would win. But the Austrian, whose airbag—now mandatory—suddenly deployed and then slowly deflated in the parc fermé, said, “It’s not just the car that’s lost its edge. That’s due to our crashes this weekend.”
Third place went to Luca de Vleeschauwer, a rider moving up from the IDM Supersport 300 class. The transition from small bikes with just over 50 hp to the more powerful 135-hp supersport bikes is a huge leap. The Belgian rider from Team Kawasaki Weber-Motos Racing clearly had no trouble with this, finishing on the podium in the first Supersport race of his career and even edging out the more experienced Andreas Kofler (Kawasaki Schnock Team Motorex).
Yves Stadelmann of the Kiefer Racing Team made quite an impression. The Swiss rider was absent from the morning warm-up. He wasn’t feeling well. “He’s probably coming down with a cold,” the team said. But by the start of the race, he had managed to pull himself together. The reward: sixth place. Incidentally, following its entry into the IDM Superbike last year, the Kiefer Racing Team now has riders competing in all three IDM solo classes.
Due to the many crashes during the race, only 15 riders crossed the finish line. Chris Beinlich (Roto-Store BRT) was the unluckiest of them all. Riding in third place with some gap to the riders ahead and behind him, he slipped over his front wheel.
Ergebnis IDM Supersport, 1. Lauf
1. Max ENDERLEIN (GER), Yamaha
2. Thomas GRADINGER (GER), Yamaha
3. Luca DE VLEESCHAUWER (BEL), Kawasaki
4. Andreas KOFLER (AUT), Kawasaki
5. Jan-Ole JÄHNIG (GER), Yamaha
6. Yves STADELMANN (CHE), Yamaha
7. Milan MERCKELBAGH (NLD), Yamaha
8. Koen MEUFFELS (NLD), Yamaha
9. Micky WINKLER (DEU), Kawasaki
10. Leon LAMBING (AUT), Yamaha