Le Mans Qualifyng Practice
DUCATI MARLBORO RIDERS WORK ON RACE SETTINGS AT LE
MANS
Ducati Marlboro Team riders Loris Capirossi and Sete Gibernau
worked hard to take a sixth and eighth place qualifying slots
respectively at Le Mans, giving Capirossi a second row grid
position, with Gibernau starting from row three. In the wet
conditions in the final untimed session, held in the morning,
each rider had shown fine form, a good omen if raceday proves
to be wet.
In the dry afternoon qualifying session, Capirossi slotted
into the lead after ten minutes had elapsed, and after many
changes of placing from there on, went second quickest with
15 minutes left to run. As other riders put in their best
laps he ended the hour-long session sixth overall, taking
a valuable second row start. Gibernau could not get full confidence
in his set-up, despite the hard work put in throughout the
day, and both riders tried out race set-ups, as well as going
for a fast qualifying time.
LORIS CAPIROSSI, sixth fastest, 1m 34.802s
"Today we focussed on the race set-up and compared two
tyres. The new one was more competitive and we will most probably
use that one tomorrow. We had to sacrifice time in qualifying
so we had no time to use the new qualifiers Bridgestone brought
here so we only did two fast laps, while other riders made
a lot more. For sure starting from a good position on the
grid is important but for us it is more important to bring
home more points in the race, that’s why we gave precedence
to the race set-up. We cannot win tomorrow, but our tyres
are better than the ones we had in China. The weather forecast
is completely unpredictable but for sure if it rains tomorrow
the race will be a big gamble."
SETE GIBERNAU, eighth fastest, 1m 34.870s
"We are working hard at it but I am not too happy with
the result. I am not feeling comfortable with my lap times
and the way I am riding, so I have to get my head down and
try to work out with the guys why I cannot enter the corners
the way I want, with both qualifying and race set-ups. That
is the whole deal I think; I am not comfortable going into
the corners so we will have to try to work around that. We
will try to make the best use of warm-up tomorrow, after we
have worked out what to change."
Temperatures: Ambient: 18 degrees. Track: 23 degrees
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