Honda TT Legends aim for a positive season finale
The Honda TT Legends’ inaugural Endurance World Championship season will come to a close this week with the final battle of the year – the 8 hours of Doha – taking place on Saturday 12 November at the Losail International Circuit in Qatar.
The novice Honda TT Legends team has been on a steep learning curve during its development year in EWC but has come away with some impressive results – not least placing in the top five in both the Bol d’Or and Le Mans 24-hour races.
Now with the final showdown in sight, the team is determined to end the season on a high. John McGuinness, Keith Amor and Cameron Donald, who are all new to the Losail track, will compete in the 8 hours of Doha for the Honda TT Legends.
Neil Tuxworth
This is the final race of what has been a very enjoyable season. We have learned an incredible amount as a team and I would hope that in Qatar all the work we have done over the season can be put in to practice. There are a lot of factors to take into account but if everything goes in our favour I think we are capable of getting on the podium. It would be nice to move up in the championship a little bit. The highest we can finish is sixth and that would be a great achievement for our first year in EWC. There are a few things going against us – none of the riders have ridden here before and we have no data from this circuit – but we have a test day before qualifying so I’m feeling confident that we can end of the year with a really good result.
John McGuinness
It’s been a real year of firsts for the team and Qatar is no exception. None of us have ridden there before but Losail looks like a great track and I’m looking forward to seeing what we can do. We came into the championship with very little experience in endurance racing and I think we can be proud of what we’ve achieved. There have been some highs and lows, but it’s been enjoyable. Hopefully we can do well at Qatar and finish on a high.
Keith Amor
I am really looking forward to riding at Losail – it’s another new track for me and it’s somewhere I have always wanted to ride. It looks like a really fun circuit. I’ve been doing lots of laps on my games console and it’s brilliant on that so hopefully it will be as good in real life! Now that we’re coming to the end of our first season, it feels like it’s gone really quickly, but it’s certainly been a good one. We have learned so much and will continue to learn in Qatar.
Cameron Donald
This will be my first visit to Qatar and I’m looking forward to learning yet another new circuit with the Honda TT Legends. I’ll be heading straight to Qatar from Australia so the hot weather should not be such a shock to the system. Its thirty degrees here in Melbourne today so my body is ready to take on what the Qatar desert has waiting for me. This is a track that few of the EWC teams have a lot of experience at, so I am confident that we can improve on our fifth position at Le Mans. Bring on the final round!
The 8 Hours of Doha will run from 1pm Arabia Standard Time (10am GMT, 11am CET) on Saturday 12 November. For real-time news, videos and images throughout the event follow @HondaTTLegends on Twitter and for post-qualifying and race reports visit www.HondaTTLegends.com
Live timing will be available at http://www.ris-timing.be/
8 Hours of Doha event schedule (AST)
Thursday 10 November
09.30 – 10.30 Free practice 1
11.30 – 12.30 Free practice 2
14.30 – 16.20 Qualifying sessions
19.00 – 20.30 Night practice
Friday 11 November
10.00 – 11.50 Qualifying sessions
Saturday 12 November
10.00 – 10.45 Warm-up
13.00 Race starts
21.00 Race ends
