FIM Supersport World Championship Magny Cours, France October 3, 2009 Final Qualifying Results (all on Pirelli tires): 1. Cal CRUTCHLOW (Yamaha YZF-R6), 1:40.980 2. Joan LASCORZ (Kawasaki ZX-6R), 1:41.146 3. Kenan SOFUOGLU (Honda CBR600RR), 1:41.253 4. Eugene LAVERTY (Honda CBR600RR), 1:41.562 5. Michele PIRRO (Yamaha YZF-R6), 1:41.720, 6. Fabien FORET (Yamaha YZF-R6), 1:41.943 7. Katsuaki FUJIWARA (Kawasaki ZX-6R), 1:41.956 8. Mark AITCHISON (Honda CBR600RR), 1:42.136 9. Andrew PITT (Honda CBR600RR), 1:42.176 10. Garry MCCOY (Triumph Daytona 675), 1:42.265 11. Matthieu LAGRIVE (Honda CBR600RR), 1:42.571 12. Barry VENEMAN (Honda CBR600RR), 1:42.578 13. Miguel PRAIA (Honda CBR600RR), 1:42.580 14. Massimo ROCCOLI (Honda CBR600RR), 1:42.648 15. Chaz DAVIES (Triumph Daytona 675), 1:42.767, crash 16. Anthony WEST (Honda CBR600RR), 1:42.954 17. Michael LAVERTY (Honda CBR600RR), 1:43.105 18. Arie VOS (Honda CBR600RR), 1:43.406 19. Olivier FOUR (Honda CBR600RR), 1:43.440 20. Dan LINFOOT (Yamaha YZF-R6), 1:44.025 More, from a press release issued by Team YZF Yamaha: Doni Tata Pradita improves Doni was quicker on Saturday than he was on Friday. He is improving regularly on a track where he is racing for the first time. Doni will start on the 6th row of the grid, with the 22nd time during the qualifying session. He worked today on the setting of the bike with the crew. He will try to score some points tomorrow on a track that he knows better now. The quickest time went to the World Championship leader Cal Crutchlow on a Yamaha, in front of Joan Lascorz. Kenan Sofuoglu will start from the 3rd position on the grid, with Eugene Laverty joining them on the first row with the 4th time. Doni Tata Pradita: “I improved from yesterday. I am a little bit happy. I keep the good spirit and my motivation for the race tomorrow. We improved the setting, but not enough. Thank you to my mechanics for working so hard. Please support me for a good race and prey for me.” Martial Garcia (team-manager): “The qualifying session was difficult. Doni was 0.6 second faster than yesterday, but he is still 22nd. I am confident for the race because the motorcycle is good. We have a good setting for the race. We must be patient because the rider needs to understand this special track.” More, from a press release issued by Parkalgar Honda: Front row puts Laverty in contention PARKALGAR HONDA’S Eugene Laverty will be fighting for the win in tomorrow’s 13th round of the World Supersport Championship at Magny Cours in France after taking fourth on the front row of the grid and posting lap times similar to all the top riders. Miguel Praia will start from 13th on the fourth row, matching his qualification position from Imola one week ago when he scored his best ever result of ninth. Yamaha’s Cal Crutchlow took pole position right at the end of the session. The racing starts at 1325CET on Sunday, October 4th and can be viewed on Eurosport or www.worldsbk.com. Eugene: “That was a good session ending in a front row it was another step forward in lap times. I have a strange sensation with the front of my Parkalgar Honda when braking and entering corners which I have never felt before, so Brains (Mark Woodage Chief Technician) is looking at the data now to see if we can sort that – but overall I am happy to be honest. We found a big step forward by softening the front end and I think we can run in the 1min41secs barrier. We are looking for another step forward to run at low 1min41secs in the race. I am not feeling much pressure, that was last weekend when I needed to peg Cal. Now I think there is a lot of pressure on Cal not to lose the Championship.” Miguel: “My qualifying lap time was done early in the session and at the time was good for eighth or ninth. It wasn’t nice to drop to 13th but we are only 0.4secs from the second row which shows how close everything is, there is really nothing in it. I am a little disappointed for my crew, they deserved better than this after all the hard work they put in sorting my set-up problems from yesterday. We need a good start in the race the same as Imola and see how far up the results we can climb.” Simon Buckmaster, Parkalgar Honda Team Manager: “It took a little while for Eugene to get going but when he did he made rapid progress and at the end was right on the pace. He can build on this and has the speed to run at the front and keep the pressure on Cal we can’t be beaten for second in the Championship but have the title to gain while Cal has it all to lose. It was a good qualifying session from Miguel and he was helped by Eugene towing him round a bit. He has a good chance of another top 10 finish given his lap times and he wants to improve on his result from last week.” More, from a press release issued by HANNspree Ten Kate Honda: Kenan Sofuoglu will start tomorrow’s penultimate 2009 World Supersport championship race at Magny-Cours in France from the front row of the grid after setting the third fastest time in today’s qualifying session. Pole position was taken by series leader Cal Crutchlow who was just a tenth of a second faster than second placed Joan Lascorz and two tenths faster than the Turkish rider. Sofuoglu’s Hannspree Ten Kate Honda team-mate, Andrew Pitt, qualified in ninth place, although the Australian rider is confident of his race pace for tomorrow’s 22-lap encounter around the 4.41km French circuit. Kenan Sofuoglu P3, 1’41.253s We had a much better qualifying session here than we did at Imola last week. Here, I was constantly fast, even though I made some mistakes during the session. We also tried a different tyre and I went one second slower, which made me lose a bit of rhythm. In my last outing, I was not able to get one clear lap but I am very confident for the race. The bike is constantly improving, and I believe it is capable of taking me to a win tomorrow. Andrew Pitt P9, 1’42.176s I’m pretty frustrated that there are a lot of slower riders out there, just touring around on the racing line and ruining other people’s laps. Unfortunately, I managed to find a few of them this afternoon but I think we have a good race pace and my ideal time would have put me a lot higher. We might not have quite the pace that Kenan is running at the moment but we’re closing the gap and the guys have given me a great bike for tomorrow. My race starts are better than my practice starts, so I’ll be looking for another one of those tomorrow. Ronald ten Kate team manager I believe we can look positively towards race day tomorrow and both riders are feeling pretty confident with their speed. Kenan and Andrew both missed an ultimate fast lap because of traffic but the progress we have made in the last couple of rounds has definitely continued here at Magny-Cours. The fire is burning again through the whole team and everyone is hungry to finish this difficult season on a high. More, from a press release issued by ParkinGO Triumph BE1 Racing: The Daytona 675 of Team ParkinGO Triumph BE1 Racing to Be Featured Exclusively on Italian Tv LA7 Team ParkinGo Triumph BE1 Racing Daytona 675 will be featured on Italian tv La7 tomorrow. After the podium celebration of race 2 in World Superbikes, an exclusive programme covered by former rider Mauro Sanchini will air at 16:25. The show will focus on the differences between the series three-cylinder and Garry McCoy and Chaz Davies’ World Supersport bikes. ParkinGo Triumph BE1 Racing riders will start from tenth and fifteenth place respectively in the penultimate WSS round of the season. McCoy had some problems at the back end of the bike and could not qualify in the first two rows, despite the fact he was fast in practice. Chaz Davies slipped while he was trying to improve his time and had to settle for the fifteenth quickest time. He is therefore bound to get a good start tomorrow in order to keep up with the front runners. GARRY McCOY | Triumph Daytona 675 | 10th in 1’42.265: “As the temperature rose, I ran into back suspension problems and so I couldn’t be as effective as this morning. I’ll start from row 3 but I’m confident about the race and my goal is to get as much points as possible in order to ensure my position in the standings”. CHAZ DAVIES | Triumph Daytona 675 | 15th in 1’42.767: “Just as I was trying to improve my time, I accelerated too aggressively and crashed. Unfortunately, there’s a big difference between the low gears and I really have to go for it when entering the corners. However, I hope to go up a few positions and repeat the Imola peformance”. MAURO SANCHINI – La7 analyst: “I’m happy I tested the Daytona 675 which actually surprised me with its engine usability and great handling when changing direction. We did a report in which we explain the basic technical regulations in Supersport by describing the changes made by team ParkinGO Triumph on the series machine, which was converted in Garry McCoy’s racing bike”. More, from a press release issued by Kawasaki: Lascorz Just Misses Pole as Kawasaki Riders Step-Up WSS, Magny Cours, France, 3 October 2009 Both Joan Lascorz and Katsuaki Fujiwara had positive practice and qualifying experiences at Magny-Cours, with Lascorz only just missing what would have been his second pole of the 2009 season. Lascorz will start Sunday’s 22-lap Supersport race second on the grid, and after some consistently good work in the pitbox and out on track, he has a machine set-up which should allow him to be fully competitive on raceday. Fujiwara was in the mix with the top ten riders all weekend, making constant improvements and finding a good path to a competitive full race set-up of his own. The times at the top of the Magny-Cours qualifying lists were closer than in some races this year, with Lascorz only 0.166 from championship leader Cal Crutchlow, and Fujiwara, seventh overall, was less than a second from the front. Twenty-nine riders qualified for the race at Magny-Cours, in what were good track conditions. Joan Lascorz: “We were very close to taking pole. When I put on my last new tyre I did two 1’41.1 laps, and my confidence was good; it was easy to do it. But then Cal went faster, and I had no new tyre to use to try and go faster again. But a front row spot is good and our race pace is very good. We made improvements step-by-step and our lap times are fast and consistent. We should have a good fight at the front tomorrow.” Katsuaki Fujiwara: “Our lap times have been good in qualifying and they got better and better as the sessions went on. We could have been third or fourth with just a relatively small improvement in times. Our set-up has just got better and better. Our race pace should be strong, and when we find the right balance on the bike it is very, very good.” More, from a press release issued by Yamaha: The Yamaha World Supersport team dug deep after yesterday’s difficult free practice session to today deliver Crutchlow a much improved set up on his R6. Crutchlow repaid their efforts, staying top four for the duration of the session before switching to fresh rubber at the end to stamp his mark on the heat, laying down an incredible 1’40.9, the only rider to break below the 1.41 second mark. As a result Crutchlow will take his tenth pole position start of the season, whilst championship rival Laverty sits at the other end of the front row in fourth. Team mate Fabien Foret was repeating the consistent fast form from yesterday, spending nearly the entire qualifying session inside the top five, only bumping down to sixth as the session came to a close. Foret will start from the second row of the grid, but with the pace showed so far this weekend should be in a good position to challenge for the podium. Cal Crutchlow, Yamaha World Supersport Team, (1st, 1’40.980) “Today was a lot better than yesterday, having been way down we’ve worked hard and performed really well. It’s going to be really close in the race, there’s going to be a lot of guys up there in the top tenth of a second so I’m really looking forward to it to see what we can do.” Fabien Foret, Yamaha World Supersport Team, (6th, 1’41.943) “I’m really happy with the bike and the way the weekend has been going s far. For tomorrow the race pace is very good so I’m pretty confident. I’m a little frustrated, I know I need to switch my brain off to get a flying lap for qualifying, which is why I’m second row at the moment, I think I deserve something better. I expect to do a good race tomorrow and fight for the podium or even better.” Wilco Zeelenberg, Yamaha World Supersport Team Manager “A much better session today, it’s difficult to judge but yesterday wasn’t a good start for the weekend and we all realized that so we had to push hard to be in front again, the crash really slowed us down. I don’t think we’ve found the best setting yet but we’ve improved a lot from this morning and tried some things this afternoon as well. With a fresh tyre Cal was impressively fast but we still need to look into the data and see what we can do for tomorrow. We need to finish in front of Eugene and the rest will follow. Fabien has had a really good weekend, he’s very happy with the bike. He’s a really good racer on a Sunday but after his crash he still struggles a bit with qualifying, he finds it hard to switch off for a lap to go faster and take extra risk. I have the feeling he can do a really good race tomorrow, he’s consistently fast with solid race pace. I think he will be fighting for the podium for sure.”