Ducati Fila launches 2004 campaign in Spain.

The championship-winning Ducati Fila team launched its 2004 World Superbike campaign in Valencia this afternoon [26 February], the day before the season gets underway at the Ricardo Tormo circuit.

With 2003 champion Neil Hodgson and team-mate Ruben Xaus both moving to MotoGP with the satellite Ducati team, Regis Laconi and James Toseland now have the task of continuing Ducati's successful record in the world's most important and prestigious production-based championship. Fourth and third respectively last year, the Frenchman and his British team-mate start the season amongst the favourites for the Superbike title, which reaches its seventeenth edition this year.

Ducati has a superb record in World Superbikes, the Italian manufacturer winning twelve of the 16 titles so far and picking up ten riders' crowns. Raymond Roche started the ball rolling in 1990 and the Frenchman was followed onto the winners' rostrum by Texan Doug Polen in 1991 and 1992. British legend Carl Fogarty scored back-to-back championship wins in 1994 and 1995, repeating the double victory in 1998 and 1999. Two Troys from Australia, Corser and Bayliss, both etched their names into the record books with wins in 1996 and 2001, while Hodgson won the title last year with the new 999 model.

After a successful start to their partnership in 2003, Ducati and title sponsor Fila will be lining up once again this year with a new Anglo-French rider pairing, an updated version of the 999 and a new tyre package from exclusive championship supplier Pirelli but with exactly the same desire to win that was demonstrated last year.

"Our commitment to the World Superbike Championship is unchanged," declared Ducati Corse MD, Claudio Domenicali, "We can see the positive effect of the development in the Superbike machine directly in our Ducati production bikes. It's clearly visible in the 999R and the 749R we have produced for this year and therefore we continue to use racing as the best 'dyno' to test and check the development and evolution of the entire superbike family. Once again, considerable development work has been carried out with our technical partner, Shell Advance, to improve the performance of the bike.

"In particular with this year's Ducati 999 Factory '04, we can find a lot of detail improvement, especially with internal modifications that further improve the global performance of the engine. For example, we developed the whole piston and connecting rod group in order to reduce the overall weight and friction, therefore to increase power output. Really, the bike is the same but there are a lot of tiny modifications, which are the normal development of a bike that has already proved to be a winning concept last year. It didn't need any major changes to continue to improve its performance."

"Our 2004 riders, Regis and James, came third and fourth in WSBK last year and showed great determination and potential during our winter tests on the 999," team director Paolo Ciabatti added, "The competition is going to be very even this year because of the spec tyre rule, and also because we have supplied a very competitive bike, the 999RS, which is very similar to our Factory machines, to several other Ducati teams. I am sure that [Frankie] Chili, [Noriyuki] Haga, [Garry] McCoy and [Steve] Martin, as well as our other rivals, will be very competitive and that the superbike races are going to be as fun to watch as they used to be."