From a press release issued by Jurgen Wimbauer:

Nicky Wimbauer (American young gun overseas) finishes 14th in Italian Championship race in Vallelunga, July 4th. 2004

Vallelunga (close to Rome, Italy) is the 3rd round of the Italian Championship and yet another new track for Nicky Wimbauer. The challenging layout and extreme hot temperatures made the tire choice and bike set-up difficult. Nicky qualified 29th on Saturday afternoon with a lap time of 1:23:33 just 3.5 seconds off pole. The field was very close and 22 riders were within 2 seconds of the qualifying lap times.

The Sunday afternoon race of 20 laps with 36 starters was held in temperatures above 103 degrees F.

Nicky’s comments: “We chased set-up issues all weekend and after a call with my old friend Thermosman (Mike Fitzgerald) we finally moved into the right direction. The warmup set-up felt much better. Italian riders are like fireworks in the first three laps, and I choose the softest tires possible so I could charge even more (a la 4th of July fireworks) and make up positions which worked out good. After a battle with Scalvini (125GP winner and now 600SS racer), the race started to settle in and I was able to keep ahead of a group of four riders. My tires started to feel really greasy and I just wanted to protect myself from the back and was unable to catch the group ahead of me. Next time (in September), I’ll know more about tackling this specific track. I can’t wait to go to Misano which is going to be the first race weekend on a track that is already familiar to me.”

Nicky Wimbauer (16) is currently in 7th place of the prestige “Trofeo Italia” which features national riders under 25 years of age, with no previous season of world-level competition.