Dominique Aegerter is starting the World Supersport races in Portimão with a lot of confidence after his tenth win of the season in Jerez. The Ten Kate Racing Yamaha rider has a 65-point lead in the championship. Galang Hendra Pratama wants to recover from a difficult weekend in Jerez.

This weekend (1-3 October), Ten Kate Racing Racing will compete for the third week in a row. This time at the Autódromo Internacional do Algarve in Portimão, a track that is named as the “rollercoaster” due to its height differences and corner combinations. Dominique Aegerter has a theoretical chance of becoming world champion this weekend. If the Swiss rider manages to turn his 65-point lead into a 100-point lead, he will be world champion on Sunday afternoon. After the races in Portugal, double World Supersport races are scheduled in Argentina and Indonesia.

Galang Hendra Pratama had an unfortunate weekend in Jerez, crashing in both qualifying and the race. The 22-year-old rider will use the Portimão round to find his rhythm and get back into the fight for championship points. The races in Portugal will get underway at 15:15 local time on Saturday afternoon and 12:30 on Sunday afternoon.

Dominique Aegerter: “I know the Portimão track from last year when I raced there in Moto2. It’s a beautiful track with great corners. I’m really looking forward to race there now with Ten Kate Racing Yamaha. It will be the first time for us as a team to ride at Portimão. We feel good and I think we are ready. I hope we can have a good start. FP1 and FP2 are very important to gather a lot of information, which is the foundation for a good qualifying and two good races.”

Galang Hendra Pratama: “It is race week again, this time in Portimão. It is a challenging track, especially with a 600 bike. Last year I managed to score points there and I would like to repeat that this year. I was very sad after my crash in Jerez. Together with the team we worked hard to find a way to regain my confidence. It is the last round in Europe. I will never give up and will give everything to score points again.”

Team manager Kervin Bos: “The end of the triple-header. It is a very busy period for us as a team with so many races in a few weeks, but of course that applies to the entire paddock. We have not tested in Portimão. Given Dominique’s form and experience in Moto2 at this track, I don’t expect any major problems. The most important thing is to keep our heads cool, keep winning races and then slowly work towards our big goal. For Galang, it will be a weekend where he has to recover, find the positive flow again and hopefully he can finish inside the points.”