Racing: Chris Vermeulen back to world superbike

Australian Chris Vermeulen will ride a Kawasaki ZX-10R in next year's world superbike title for Paul Bird Motorsport.

The team is currently fielding Newcastle's Broc Parkes and Japan's Makota Tamada in this year's championship, but the results have been poor.

However, there have been some bright patches amongst the storm clouds, and it may take a rider of Vermeulen's calibre to get the best out of Kawasaki's litre-class sportsbike flagship - especially as the bike is not likely to receive a major update until the 2011 model year.

And with the official announcement that Ben Spies has taken one of the last MotoGP seats for 2010 at Tech 3 Yamaha alongside Colin Edwards, Vermeulen had to move quickly to guarantee his racing future.

After discussions with a number of world superbike teams, he eventually opted to go with Kawasaki, which has been a perennial cellar dweller over the last couple of years.

"It's a really good deal and I'm excited about joining Kawasaki from the technical point of view, to race and develop the bike next year and then go out on the new bike for 2011," Vermeulen told motocyclenews.com.

"WSB is going to be their main project, they are pulling out of MotoGP and they will not be running an AMA team nor a team in the Australian SBK championship - this WSB program is where all their engineers and budget will be focussed. They haven't won in WSB for a long time and they really want to win races.

"The financial backing and resources is very good for this project."

Vermeulen will be replaced in Suzuki's MotoGP squad by Spaniard Alvaro Bautista in 2010.

Meanwhile, Yamaha's 2010 world superbike team will be all-new for the second year running, with Toseland returning to the class where he was dual world champion in 2004 and 2008. He will be joined by Cal Crutchlow to make it an all-British outfit.

Ducati has also re-signed Haga and Michel Fabrizio for 2010, while Max Biaggi, Max Neukirchner and Jonathan Rea will remain at Aprilia, Suzuki and Honda respectively.

Vermeulen raced world superbike in 2004-2005, and scored 10 wins. He was second in the 2005 title behind countryman Troy Corser.

Vermuelen doesn't yet have a teammate for 2010, but there are reports British pair Tom Sykes and Shane Byrne are in contention for the second seat, leaving Parkes without a ride.

The Australian round of the 2010 Superbike World Championship will be held at Phillip Island from February 26-28.