KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia’s World SuperSport Championship rider Zulfahmi Khairuddin collected just two points in Aragon, Spain, after finishing in 14th place – and he is unhappy with the way things turned out.
"I am happy because I finished the race, but I am not so happy with the result because I know I could have done so much better," he said.
Zulfahmi recorded a time of 1:57.039 seconds, 31.912s behind winner Lucas Mahias, who was also the 2016 Endurance World Championship winner.
The former Moto2 rider knew that he was starting to go off track this year when his Kawasaki ZX-6R presented problems in the second round in Thailand, where he recorded his first DNF (did not finish).
However, Zulfahmi was just glad to get the bike home safely, despite a few setbacks during the race.
"(Gino Rea’s) bike was smoking, I could see some oil coming out and I had to be careful, as passing him wasn't easy. Then, the black flag was put out for him, which paved the way for me to catch up to the group.
"But every time I got past the group, they hauled me in because I just didn't have the acceleration to get away from them," he said.
After three races, Zulfahmi is in 20th position with just six points – 39 points behind leader GRT Yamaha's Mahias, with 45 points.
Zulfahmi, 25, will head to the Netherlands next to compete at the Acerbis Dutch Round on April 28-30.