Team Suzuki Press Office – April 17.
Suzuki Endurance Racing Team rider Gregg Black talks about lockdown and what he and the SERT team are doing to keep fit and staying optimistic during the crisis.
“At this precise moment we should be at Le Mans qualifying for the 24H le Mans race, as you can see, the 43rd edition of the 24 Hours of Le Mans has now been postponed to August 29-30th.
“It’s a hard moment for all of us – teams and riders and we are at home basically waiting for the races to be able to start again. Of course the priority of the moment is the health of everyone and staying at home can only help to get us out of this situation as fast as possible to get back to a normal life.
“For us riders it is really hard, we get prepared all year round to be ready to race, as now we don’t know exactly when we are going to be able to ride/ test and race again, it’s pretty hard to keep our training level right up there.
“On my side I have my personal gym, so I can keep physical training at a good level, cycling (as you can see on the photo virtual riding on Zwift with other people and riders), also running, and all different type of exercises. But of course I cannot ride a motorbike, and this is really missing.
“We actually did a cycling race last weekend on virtual Zwift with 40 other people and many riders from Endurance, World Superbike and national championships. This was a 24-hour race by teams of five and one-hour stints: A good moment for training; it did not replace the real 24H Le Mans race but was still good fun.
“It’s hard for us because we need to be ready basically all the time. If the racing starts again in a few weeks then when we get back on the bike we need to be performant after a few laps. So our motivation needs to stay high all the time.
“I live in the countryside so on my part I am pretty free and I have a lot of things to sort out during this period, which I would probably had never done in a normal situation.
“We also keep exchanging with all the team, we have a WhatsApp group with everybody to keep a good contact between all of us. Also, we make a Visio call between Damien, our Team Manager and my team mates every week.
“We hope to be back to a normal life soon and get back on our beast #2!!!
“Keep safe and speak soon
Gregg Black”
#RidersAtHome #SuzukiStaySafe #StayAtHome
