The summer break has started and it’s time to look back on the first few races of the year. It’s been a few intense months, and there’s one thing about which I’m truly happy: to be part of SIC58 Squadra Corse. Paolo, Marco and the whole team have made me feel at home since the first day. In each Grand Prix, we have worked very hard to score the perfect bike set up and I have to say we’re getting closer and closer. We’ve been consistent in this first few months together, yet I’m eager to start the second part of the season to show more on track. I know that we are competitive together: now we can put together the knowledge we’ve gathered and pay back the guys for their hard work.

In the meantime, while Silverstone is still around one month away, I am training in Murcia and enjoying the sunshine in the South of Spain. I’ve been coming here more and more often in the past three years. Murcia feels like a second home to me now. I can count on the training plan prepared by Paco, from Pakosta school, plenty of circuits were to train and a great bunch of fast riders with whom I can fight on track.  

It’s never easy to live abroad and so far from home, but when I come to Murcia everyone is welcoming and curious about my story. I would have never thought that I could find such great support so far from my family and my hometown, Fukuoka. Many people seem surprised when I explain to them that I’m familiar with many places in the area of Murcia, such as Molina de Segura, Ceutí and Lorquí. Yet there’s nothing that makes me happier than knowing that in those towns there’s people that believe in me and support me while I race around the planet.