2006 Superbike World Championship Round 11, Imola, Italy
Circuit: 4.959 kms. Weather: Dry, sunny/cloudy 22-26C
Friday qualifying, 29th September
SUPER NINTH FOR MAX ON DAY ONE.
Team Alstare Engineering Corona Extra rider Max Neukirchner
finished the first day of qualifying at Imola with the ninth
fastest time, in a session that saw the top thirteen riders
separated by less than a second! Max, like his fellow Alstare
riders Troy Corser and Yukio Kagayama , suffered rear grip
problems in the afternoon when the track temperature rose.
Max’s ninth position today was ahead of factory riders
from Ducati, Yamaha, Honda and Kawasaki and was a good start
to the weekend.
MAX - 9th, 1:50.659
I’m very happy today because I feel that the whole package
is improving. The morning session was good, but when we made
a change to the chassis for the afternoon session it was not
so good. So we went back to the morning setting and worked
from that. In the afternoon, when it was hotter, the grip
was definitely down and that is a problem that we’ve
had before and that is our biggest problem at the moment.
We’ll try some front and rear suspension changes tomorrow
morning and see we can improve the bike.
Friday qualifying
1 Toseland (GB-Honda) 1:50.039, 2 TROY CORSER (Aus-Alstare
Suzuki Corona Extra) 1:50.250, 3 Bayliss (Aus-Ducati) 1:50.265,
4 YUKIO KAGAYAMA (J-Alstare Suzuki Corona Extra) 1:50.357,
5 Barros (Bra-Honda) 1:50.388, 6 Xaus (E-Ducati) 1:50.468,
7 Pitt (Aus-Yamaha) 1:50.502, 8 Fabrizio (I-Honda) 1:50.553,
9 MAX NEUKIRCHNER (D-Alstare Engineering Corona Extra) 1:50.659,
10 Clementi (I-Ducati) 1:50.76
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