Munich (DE), 19th September 2016. The BMW Motorrad Motorsport
community can celebrate an historic world championship title: at the
season finale in Donington (GB), Finnish duo Pekka Päivärinta/Kirsi
Kainulainen were crowned the 2016 FIM Sidecar World Champions.
Kainulainen is the first ever woman to win a world title in road
racing. Their 44-Racing sidecar is powered by a BMW S 1000 RR engine,
and the BMW Motorrad Motorsport experts supported
Päivärinta/Kainulainen with engine hardware and set-up. Together with
the team, the specialists modified and set up the powerful BMW engine
in order to perfectly match the special requirements of a modern sidecar.
Over the course of the season, the “Flying Finns” have been the most
consistent team. They finished all nine races on the podium, including
their historic win at the end of June at Pannonia-Ring (HU), when
Kainulainen was the first ever woman to win a world championship race
in road racing.
They arrived at the final weekend at Donington with an advantage of
23 points over their closest rivals. Because of this they just had to
collect a further three points in the last race of the season to
secure the title. However, Päivärinta/Kainulainen once more put in a
brilliant performance and raced to second place on the podium. In the
final standings, they ended the season with 177 points to their name
and an advantage of 18 points.
It was the first world championship title in sidecar racing for BMW
since 1974, when Klaus Enders (DE) and Ralf Engelhardt (DE) finished
the season as world champions. The German manufacturer had dominated
sidecar racing from the 1950ies to the 1970ies, winning a total of 21
world championship titles between 1954 and 1974.
In addition, BMW was able to celebrate a further title win at the
race weekend in Donington: Taylor Mackenzie (GB) was crowned champion
in the Superstock class of the British Superbike Championship. He
claimed his sixth win of the season with his Buildbase BMW Motorrad
BMW S 1000 RR and his lead can’t be beaten in the final race, which
will be held in the middle of October.
“Congratulations to Pekka and Kirsi for this well deserved world
championship title,” said Berthold Hauser, Technical Director BMW
Motorrad Motorsport. “They had a great and very consistent season. In
all the races they showed the perfect combination of speed and
cleverness. Last year, they were fighting for the title until the very
last race and, by finishing third overall, passenger Kirsi was the
first ever woman to win a world championship medal in road racing.
This season they continued their streak of success in an impressive
manner. The historic win in Hungary was the next step, and now to be
crowned world champions is just a fantastic achievement.
Congratulations also to Taylor for winning the title in the BSB
Superstock class. The RR racers are displaying a great performance in
the series this season, with nine wins in 11 races so far and many,
many podiums. We as BMW Motorrad Motorsport are very proud to have
contributed to these titles with our technical support.”