Dedicated to Turkish motorcycle racers competing on the world stage and more!
Toprak Razgatlıoğlu
© BMW Motorrad WorldSBK
Birth Place:
Alanya, Turkey
Date of Birth:
16 October 1996 (Age 27)
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Career Highlights:
* FIM Motul WorldSBK Champion 2021
* European Stock 600 Champion 2015
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Current Race Number:
54
Social Media:
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Introduction​
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The younger son of famous stunt rider "Tek Teker" ("Wheelie") Arif, Toprak got his first taste of two wheels at the tender age of five when his father taught him how to ride a 50cc motocross bike. Despite winning four national motocross championships in his formative years, Arif decided that Toprak's destiny lay in tarmac racing - and how right he would prove to be!
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The switch to road racing was made when Toprak was 11 years old and in 2011 and 2012 he went on to compete in the IDM Yamaha R6 Cup before switching to the Red Bull Rookies Cup for the 2013 and 2014 campaigns. And it's at the end of the 2014 season - when Toprak was out of a ride - that his fortunes really took a turn for the better. For this was when Kenan SofuoÄŸlu - at the time already a triple World Supersport Champion - took Toprak under his wing, providing financial, professional and moral support.
Cranked over on the Kawasaki ZX-10R Superstock bike, Assen Netherlands, 2017
Learning the ropes
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With Kenan now in his corner, Toprak won the 2015 European Stock 600 Championship at a canter, winning five of the eight races in total for the Kawasaki Puccetti Racing team. He wanted to switch to the World Supersport Championship with the desire of following in his mentor's footsteps, but Kenan had other ideas and insisted Toprak's taller body frame was better suited to the bigger 1000cc bikes. So for the 2016 and 2017 seasons Toprak further honed his skills in the Superstock 1000 series, where he won a total of three races in his second season in the class.
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Having established himself as a front runner in Superstock 1000, Toprak finally stepped up to the World Superbike class for the 2018 season, once again riding in Kawasaki Puccetti Racing colours. He had a solid, if unspectacular rookie season with just a single podium to his name, and even into the 2019 season it wasn't until midway through the campaign that he made a significant breakthrough - scoring eight podium finishes before finally breaking his WSB duck at the French round at Magny Cours, winning Race 1 and the shorter Sprint Race.
Hitting the apex on the Turkish Puccetti Racing Kawasaki ZX-10R, Imola Italy, 2018
Greatness beckons
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Toprak was now the hottest property in WSB and duly earnt himself a factory ride with the Pata Yamaha squad for 2020. He enjoyed a dream start on his debut for the team, winning the season opener at Philip Island and he was a regular podium visitor in the early stages of the Pandemic interrupted season. However, by the midway point of the shortened race calendar, his form dipped; he endured a difficult time at the double header at Aragon and worse was yet to come when he injured himself in a Warm Up crash at Catalunya on the Sunday morning, forcing him to sit out the day's two races. Bouncing back with commanding victories in Race 1 and the Superpole race at the final round in Estoril secured a respectable but ultimately disappointing fourth in the standings.
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Now into his fourth season in the class, and with an improved bike for 2021, it was time for Toprak to fulfil his potential and prove that he was ready to take the fight to six-time champion Jonathan Rea. And he did just that, although he had to wait until the third round of the season in Misano to open his account with a win in the second feature length race. What followed at the next round at Donnington Park is arguably Toprak's finest moment; qualifying way down the grid in 13th place in treacherous wet conditions, come the race proper the track was mostly dry but still very damp in places...
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Toprak made a blistering start and with a dazzling display of skill and bravery out-braked and out-manoeuvred a gaggle of riders to enter the first corner in fifth place, and by the end of first lap he was up to a scarcely believable second position! This outstanding display of raw talent in tricky conditions drew comparisons with the late, great Ayrton Senna's legendary opening lap at the same venue in 1993, when having dropped to fifth position heading into Redgate, Senna went on to muster all of his wet weather expertise to pass the four cars ahead of him and lead the race by the end of Lap 1...
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The gloves come off
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The rest of the 2021 season could be described as the motorsport equivalent of two heavyweight boxers standing toe to toe and slugging it out. The title fight swung back and forth between the #54 and #1 from one round to the next. This was the first time since joining Kawasaki that Rea had been put under so much sustained pressure over the course of an entire season and he was beginning to push past his and the bike's limits, crashing uncharacteristically at numerous rounds as the season wore on.
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The rivalry between the two championship protagonists reached a controversial fever pitch at the Magny Cours round in France. Although Toprak won the Superpole race, pipping Rea to victory at the death, a protest lodged by Kawasaki alleging Toprak touched a green painted section of track on the final lap (he did, if only by the slightest of margins) was upheld by Race Direction and Toprak was subsequently stripped of the win, denying him of his first ever ‘triple’ victory.
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The fallout from 'Green Line-gate' added another layer of intensity to their rivalry; while both riders were diplomatic and mostly smiles in their interviews, the hectic and robust nature of their ensuing battles (notabably at the Portimao round) was proof that the stakes had been raised.
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A new King is crowned
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The title decider went right down to the wire at the newly designed Mandalika circuit in Indonesia, but it should be noted that all three of Toprak's DNFs up to that point were not due to rider error; two were mechanical faults and the other being the now infamous first corner incident at Assen when Garrett Gerloff knocked Toprak off with a speculative passing attempt. If not for those lost points, the championship would have been wrapped up way before the final round in Indonesia.
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As it was, Rea won both races but a second place finish was all that Toprak required in Race 1 to seal his first WSB Championship, and only Yamaha's second in the class since Ben Spies achieved the feat in his rookie year in 2009!
For the 2022 season Toprak donned the fabled #1 plate in defence of his crown.
© Yamaha Racing - Toprak leads Jonathon Rea at Jerez Spain - 2021
© Yamaha Racing - Celebrating winning the World Superbike Championship, 2021
Hunter becomes the hunted​
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In some ways, the 2022 season was Toprak's most impressive. He took more overall wins than in his championship-winning season the year before, as well as claiming his first career 'triples' (a clean sweep of the weekend, winning all three races) at Donington Park and Mandalika.
However, the re-emergence of Spain's Alvaro Bautista, now reunited with the Arubi.it Racing Ducati squad, proved too much for 'Stoprak' and Pata Yamaha to defend their titles. Bautista was instantly up to speed on the Ducati Panigale; his clean riding style and diminutive frame, paired with the Panigale's superior acceleration and top speed, made for a highly effective all-round package. He was consistently the fastest rider on the straights, and his lower weight was kinder on the tyres.
And most importantly, Bautista matured as a rider. Unlike in 2019, when having made a blistering start to the first half of the season only to throw it away in the second half of the year by crashing with alarming regularity, on the very rare occasions the Spaniard struggled in 2022, he still took home valuable points.
© WorldSBK - Setting the pace in Madalika, Indonesia, 2022
Calculated Risk?
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The 2023 WorldSBK season was once again dominated by Arubi.it Ducati's Alvaro Bautista - the reigning champion comprehensively defending his '22 crown in emphatic fashion, notching up six 'treble' victories across the season. However, the stats alone don't paint the entire picture of what might have been: Toprak was on the receiving end of some truly bad luck, most notably a catastrophic rear tyre failure while leading Race 2 of the Most round (Czech Republic).
That DNF was the defining moment in the title race, as the momentum was beginning to swing in Toprak's favour. A victory would have brought him within touching distance of points leader Bautista. As it was, he lost out on a vital 25 points, which were inherited by his title rival as if to further rub salt in the wound.
And despite the obvious disparity in performance between the Ducati and Yamaha, 'Stoprak' put on some truly awe-inspiring performances battling the Spaniard. Their race-long, titanic tussles in Race 2 of both the Portuguese and Spanish rounds will go the down in the annuls of WorldSBK history as some of the most frenetic, breathless, daring and exciting battles ever!
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The No.54 surprised everyone as the season drew towards an end when he announced that after four seasons he was ending his relationship with Pata Yamaha, and starting a new adventure with the ROKiT BMW Motorrad WorldSBK team for the 2024 campaign. While it has shown glimpses of its potential on occasion, the BMW M 1000 RR is not considered a consistent, race-winning machine so there is a definite risk element as far as Toprak is concerned; that being said, it could be argued that if he is successful on the Bavarian bike, he will receive all the plaudits and adulation deserving of such an accomplishment. If however success is not forthcoming, then it will leave no doubt that the bike is fundamentally in need of improvement as 'El Turco' is a proven champion and front-runner.
© WorldSBK - Getting to grips with the BMW M1000-RR at Portimão, Portugal, 2023