World Superbike Championship
Round four: Valencia, Spain
Qualifying report one
 HANNspree
Ten Kate Honda completes first Valencia qualifying
The fourth round of the 2007 World Superbike Championship
kicked off at a warm and sunny Ricardo Tormo Circuit in Valencia
today. The threat of rain did not materialise as the HANNspree
Ten Kate Honda riders took to the 4km track for the first
qualifying session. James Toseland and Roberto Rolfo secured
third and seventeenth places respectively.
Toseland bounced back from a head cold to battle it out in
the top three with Troy Bayliss and Ruben Xaus. The focus
during the 45-minute session was finding a good race set-up
for the Honda CBR1000RR. With this in mind, the British rider
secured several consistently fast laps before settling into
third place with a final best time of 1'35.147.
The first day of qualifying proved more difficult for team-mate
Rolfo as he fought hard to get to grips with the challenging
Valencia track. The team will work on the set-up of the bike
overnight in the hope that the Italian rider can turn his
fortunes around in tomorrow's second qualifying session.
Ronald ten Kate, Team Manager:
"James did really well today. Considering that we didn't
have the test here a couple of weeks ago when we didn't join
because we had a lot of planning to do, it seems it is possible
for him to be fast around this track anyway. We concentrated
a lot on race tyres today so that we didn't use the soft tyres
in case of rain tomorrow. At the moment the forecast for Sunday
is no rain so we wanted to make sure we had a good dry set-up.
With Roberto Rolfo we are all a bit unpleasantly surprised
because in Donington he really picked up the pace. For some
reason it is not working here. We are checking all the data
overnight because he must be capable of moving up the grid
and I'm sure he and his crew can manage that."
James Toseland:
"It's not been too bad today. We have been trying to
find a good set-up on race tyres while it is dry. I'm just
starting to feel like myself again and I think we've got off
to a really good start. In previous years this has not been
the best track for Honda, but we've really made a lot of progress
and I think we can be competitive tomorrow. I'm just hoping
for good weather!"
Roberto Rolfo:
"I am obviously disappointed about today. After Donington
I was feeling good about my riding style on the bike, but
here it is just not going right for me. It is a very different
track so I just have to work hard to adjust my style again.
We will do a lot of work this evening and I hope that I can
improve for tomorrow."
Qualifying times:
1 T. Bayliss 1'34.599
2 R. Xaus 1'35.023
3 J. Toseland 1'35.147
4 N. Haga 1'35.440
5 M. Biaggi 1'35.453
6 T. Corser 1'35.483
7 L. Lanzi 1'35.709
8 M. Neukirchner 1'35.767
9 F. Nieto 1'35.804
10 K. Muggeridge 1.35.814
17 R. Rolfo 1'36.455
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