2006 Superbike World Championship
Round 6 – Misano (Italy) - First Qualifying
TOSELAND CLOSE TO POLE TIME AFTER FIRST QUALIFYING
SESSION
James Toseland (Winston Ten Kate Honda) made strong early
progress on his CBR1000RR at Misano, finishing the day eighth
fastest, but consistently finding himself in the top echelons
during each practice session. He would finish eighth overall,
but only 0.650 seconds away from the quickest rider. Karl
Muggeridge (Winston ten Kate Honda) had a crash, which held
back his progress on the stopwatches, but otherwise felt day
one was a move in the right direction for machine set-up and
tyre evaluation. He finished day one 15th quickest, but knows
there is great room for improvement in the final qualifying
session on Saturday morning.
With track temperatures peaking well over 50°C Misano
was once more a stiff test for all the competing riders. The
main problem to overcome, however, was the air temperature
of over 30°C, and the competition itself was equally searing,
with 14 riders within a second of Troy Bayliss’ pole
time, and 25 within two seconds.
Ronald Ten Kate - Team Manager
“It is going quite well on the Superbike side of things.
With James we have already made quite a few longer runs on
race tyres, and he seems to be able to put in pretty good
times consistently. At the end we tried to put in some new
tyres and make some better lap times but unfortunately we
did not manage to do that. But tomorrow is another day. We
still have quite a few improvements we can make to the machine
anyway. For Karl we had basically the same strategy; running
race tyres and then going for a quicker lap with a new rear
tyre. In his quick lap he had a crash, but for sure he will
be up the grid after tomorrow. Our aim is to get both riders
on the front row.”
James Toseland – Winston Ten Kate Honda Rider
(8th position – Fastest lap time 1’35.553)
“We were consistently one of the quickest and just
with the new race tyre we have one problem around the long
left corner, when it’s in a lower gear at maximum torque.
The times are very close, so I’m not too worried about
eighth place right now, because the bike feels good and the
team is working well.”
Karl Muggeridge – Winston Ten Kate Honda Rider
(15th position – Fastest lap time 1’35.965)
“We had a few things to try in that timed session and
we ran out of time a bit, so we didn’t get a chance
to put in a new front tyre with the new rear, to find the
best overall setting for today. So I just went with a front
that had done a dozen laps and the rear was brand new. It
gave me a few warnings but on the last chicane, even though
it all felt right until I fell, I ended up on my head. It’s
not the way it’s supposed to be. Otherwise things feel
pretty good, we have good speed from the bike, and I am confident
we can do it; but we don’t need these little setbacks
along the way. But we have another qualifying tomorrow anyway.”
RESULTS QUALIFYING 1:
1. Bayliss - Ducati - 1'34.903
2. Corser - Suzuki - 1'35.016
3. Laconi - Kawasaki - 1'35.166
4. Walker - Kawasaki - 1'35.255
5. Martin - Petronas - 1'35.313
8. Toseland - Winston Ten Kate Honda - 1'35.553
15. Muggeridge - Winston Ten Kate Honda - 1'35.965
|
