After Aragón and Estoril, Ten Kate Racing’s Dominique Aegerter and Leonardo Taccini completed a two-day test at TT Circuit Assen, the home circuit of the Nieuwleusen-based team.

Whilst the four test days in Spain and Portugal were mainly disrupted by bad weather, on Monday and Tuesday the track in Assen was dry, albeit in cold conditions.

For Dominique Aegerter it was a renewed acquaintance with the TT Circuit Assen after he won both races last season during the Dutch round of the FIM Supersport World Championship. The Swiss rider didn’t need much time to get used to the Dutch track, he was up to speed immediately and set some impressively fast lap times during the test.

For Leonardo Taccini it was the first time at the TT Circuit Assen on his Ten Kate Racing prepared Yamaha YZF-R6. The Italian had a difficult first day, due to a crash a lot of track time was lost. During the second day the rider from Rome recovered well and managed to make constant progress throughout the day.

Dominique Aegerter: “Our third winter test has been completed here in Assen, the home circuit of the team. Luckily the rain didn’t come this time, although during the first day it was very cold in the morning, I think about six degrees. We were able to try a lot of things and our lap times were good, almost as fast as during practice in July last year. It was also nice to catch up with Gerrit and Ronald ten Kate about the past season. I’m now going back to Switzerland for four days, where I will visit my physiotherapist a few times because my rib is still bothering me a bit, this is because of my crash in Estoril. I’m looking forward to the two test days at Motorland Aragón and the first race weekend there.

Leonardo Taccini: “What can I say, the start of the test here wasn’t very good because during the first day I crashed and therefore I didn’t manage to do a lot of laps. During the second day it all went a lot better and we made some steps during the day. I apologise to the team for the crash, but all in all we learned a lot and despite the crash we can look back on a successful test here in Assen.”

Kervin Bos, Ten Kate Racing team manager: “After Aragon and Estoril I think we can say that we can look back on a successful two-day test here in Assen. We were able to complete our full test programme and Dominique was also very fast afterwards, which is very promising with the start of the season just around the corner.

On the other side of the box, Leonardo had a slightly more difficult start to this test with a crash on the first day. This caused him to lose quite a lot of track time, which is of course a shame. During the second day he was able to ride more, the potential is definitely there but we need to dot the i’s and cross the t’s so he can ride his laps more consistently. Let the season begin, we are ready for it.

All in all, a successful third and final winter test before the team will travel to Aragón in the coming days. Another two-day test session is scheduled on April 4-5 at Motorland Aragón before the 2022 season kicks off on Friday April 8 at the same venue.