ONDŘEJ VOSTATEK HAS FINISHED THE SEASON ON THE PODIUM AT CEV SPAIN!
After switching teams, Ondřej Vostatek has been among the leading competitors of the last Spanish championship races in the Pre-moto 3 category and has once again reached the TOP 5 in Jerez. He had been among the fastest even since the first training runs on Thursday, beating one Spanish star after another. He would confirm it officially in the timed qualification, beating all of the racers who had qualified for the Red Bull Rookies Cup 2018. He placed fourth in the first qualification, being 0.286 seconds short of first place, and second in the second qualification only 0.143 seconds behind. This would result in a starting 4th on the grid. In the warm-up on Sunday, he had once again performed very well with the third best time, and everything suggested that we were about to see the best result of the season.
In the race, Ondřej started well and held his position, but the positions had already started changing in the first sector. Ondřej was on pace with the leading group throughout the entire race. However, Barry Baltus, who was just ahead of Ondřej, began to lose contact with the group and our racer struggled to overtake him. When he finally managed to do so, he already was 2 seconds behind the leading group. While he managed to reduce the gap over the last two laps, it still seemed that the result will not meet expectations. At the end of the race, four racers from the leading group crashed on the last curve, moving our racer into fourth place. It was soon determined that third place had been taken by a rider who had illegally used a more powerful motorcycle with unapproved electronics, which resulted in his disqualification. This meant Ondřej was awarded third place, taking his first podium place in this tournament.
After the race, Jan Vostatek told us:
"We are really glad that it ended up working out for us – we even had some good luck. Ondřej has been working really hard for the entire season. He's been getting along very well with the new team even though this is only his second race. I'm just completely satisfied with how hard the boys have worked. We have managed to get it just right with the team and the material, which is a perfect fit for Ondřej. I can't help but highlight how well the difficult decision has paid off. It is very positive that we had been in the lead for the whole 4 days and confirmed every day back to back that we belonged there. The difference between our time and the first place was always about 0.1-0.3 seconds. It is actually also the greatest success of our team – never before have we achieved such success in this category, which makes the feeling all the more perfect."
"After 4 years in Spain, we are once again feeling great encouragement, satisfaction and motivation for our further effort and it feels like we're on the right track. It is a great feeling to see a boy work really hard since he was 6 years old and have it work out. Plain and simple, there is only one Czech to hold a trophy from CEV Pre-moto3 Spain, which is Ondřej Vostatek, and I'm very proud to call him my son."
Ondřej Vostatek added:
"The races were absolutely awesome. Moreover, this track is one of my personal favourites. There is great atmosphere in our team and we've been getting along perfectly. The bike has been working great and it is a lot of fun to ride for me. In the race, I had a really good start and joined the leading group. The strategy was to keep up with the group and not to rush too much. We knew that it's all going to come down to the last curve, where people tend to overtake each other, as well as crash if there is an entire group of racers looking for a strong finish. That is why I was really paying as much attention as possible. Nobody was messing about, approaching both from the right and left at the same time. There even was a front wheel contact, which I managed to withstand, but it cost me two positions. I then struggled a lot to overtake Baltus and lost the leading group a little bit. It looked like I was not going to make it, but then the last curve happened – one racer made a mistake and took three more riders out, and I ended up finishing third. It was fantastic and my best race of the season. I would therefore like to thank everyone who believed in me, my team, my family (who often don't have the easiest time supporting me) and above all my sponsors – Compos Distribution and Psi Hubík, who continue allowing me to do what I love to do. I have one more race ahead of me, FIM CEV Repsol in Valencia, and I hope that I'll be able to conclude the season with a nice result."
