Mercado injured, Staring steps in at Phillip Island

Team Pedercini's Leandro Mercado will now not take part in the opening round of the 2012 Superbike World Championship at Phillip Island, after the 19 year-old Superbike debutant broke the radius bone in his right arm in a crash on his supermoto bike during a training session last week in Argentina.

On Monday "Tati" Mercado underwent an operation to speed up rehabilitation. He will be back for the second round at Imola, scheduled for April 1st, and his place at Phillip Island will be taken by Australian Bryan Staring. Bryan already took part in the race last year with the Italian Team - as a wild card - in the first round of the World Superbike at Phillip Island, finishing with a fifteenth and a seventeenth place in the two races.

"I'm really disappointed because I won't be able to take part in the Phillip Island races as it was to be my Superbike debut," said Mercado. "I was eager to compete in Australia hoping to obtain good results. I know the whole team worked extremely hard to prepare my bike for the first appointment of the season and now I'm forced to miss out on the race. Starting from next week, with the help of my doctors, I'll start intensive rehabilitation to make sure that I'll be in top condition for the second race in Imola".