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His team-mate Troy Corser spent his first day of action working through various machine settings in preparation for Sunday's 22 lap Superbike races, and thus was an unusually lowly 15th on the first day rankings. Corser had to react quickly to avoid a crash that caused the first of two interruptions to the Superbike qualifying session, and the session was finally ended by a second red flag, with only seconds remaining.
The day dawned with a wet track surface at Assen after overnight rain, but occasional sunshine and track temperatures which eventually almost hit 30°C allowed the lap times to drop and the teams to make progress in finding solutions for this fast and unique circuit.
David Checa (Yamaha GMT94) just edged out Corser in the first day's order and a three rider Yamaha run was completed by Team YZF Yamaha rider Shinichi Nakatomi, who was 16th fastest. Sebastien Gimbert (Yamaha GMT94) was 21st fastest on the first day, but less than 1.5 seconds from provisional pole man Troy Bayliss.
Noriyuki Haga (2nd - 1'40.009 - Yamaha Italy WSB Team)
"I didn't have any problems after the crash, I just folded the front on the first right after the back straight. I used the second bike and it felt a bit different but we can make it feel more like my number one bike tomorrow. We need to get the gearing sorted as well, between third and fourth gear. We are nearly there with the overall set-up; we'll just make some adjustments in the suspension settings. I think we have a choice of one tyre fitment, for the front and the rear, so tomorrow we will check that by doing a long run."Troy Corser (15th - 1'40.778 - Yamaha Italy WSB Team) "We are just trying different things, swingarms, shock specs and offsets, to try and get the bike set-up for the real race conditions. I know I can do the lap times in qualifying but we are trying to get the bike ready to do some long runs on the tyres. The track is not offering a lot of grip right now and when the bike slides it slides quite fast. I almost got tangled up in a crash at turn one, just missed the guy's bike in front when he highsided."
Massimo Meregalli (Team Manager, Yamaha Motor Italia WSB Team)
"Noriyuki's fall left him on his second bike for most of the session and it seems he had a better feeling on his number one bike. But he improved his time even on his second bike and that was significant. Troy is working hard to get the bike balance right and they know what they are looking for in the set-up. I think as usual he will be right there for tomorrow."Shinichi Nakatomi (16th - 1'40.817 seconds - Team YZF Yamaha)
"We had a lot of early problems with the machine settings and with only 15 minutes remaining in the afternoon session we changed the rear shock, and went 1.5 seconds faster. I am sure we can make more progress tomorrow and I will push hard to get into Superpole."Parkes fastest despite first day fall
Fabien Foret worked hard in the two opening practice sessions but never quite found the same level of competitiveness as he did in testing, finishing up ninth fastest, largely due to a significant increase in track and air temperatures since the test. The former World Champion and Assen race winner is confident that he can find his missing speed when he reverts to more conventional machine settings on day two.
Relatively warm spring weather bathed the majority of the afternoon session after overnight rains had dried in time for serious track action, with the notorious Assen weather also set to be fair on the second day of competition.
Massimo Roccoli (Yamaha Team Italia Lorenzini by Leoni) scored a fine sixth best time on his R6, despite not having found an optimum machine set-up so far. Yamaha Spain riders David Salom and Angel Rodriguez had very different experiences at Assen on day one, with Rodriguez going fifth quickest in his stand-in role for team regular David De Gea, while Salom was only 19th.
Broc Parkes (1st - 1'41.416 - Yamaha World Supersport Team)
"A really good result considering that I only did three laps in the morning, after I highsided when I looked over my shoulder with one hand on the handlebar. I don't think anything too serious has happened but my left hand is very swollen right at the point of pressure where I push the handlebar. I was struggling a little bit on the bike so I was surprised to see where we finished. The bike is working very well but I am not using it to its full strength at the moment, because of my hand. The recent test we did really helped us with setting up the bike for qualifying today. If we hadn't tested I'm not sure I could have done the lap time. I have hurt my throttle hand before so it's a lot better to have hurt my left hand, especially with all the fast changes of direction here. You are always pushing on the handlebars at Assen."Fabien Foret (9th - 1m 42.258 - Yamaha World Supersport Team)
"I think I took the wrong way trying to set-up my bike. What we used last week in the test was OK, but the weather was much cooler then. As soon as I want to push hard things didn't work out the way I expected, so we have gone back to a setting I would normally have used in the past. Tomorrow we have a chance to improve. We missed this session a bit but no drama, and we should be OK for the race, as always."Wilco Zeelenberg (Team Manager, Yamaha World Supersport Team)
"For Broc we are basically running the same settings we had in our recent test, and to try anything new now is not a good idea, because he is a little injured. But he is still happy with the bike even if the track conditions have changed a bit. It affects Broc less because his style is quite fluid. With the track now warmer the test settings don't work so well for Fabien, so we go back now to the settings we had before. He still has a good feeling with the bike, and his slides are very controllable, but for him to do 1'41 lap times he needs to have the bike a bit more rigid."Angel Rodriguez: (5th - 1'41.992 seconds - Yamaha Spain)
"I'm very happy with team, with the bike and with the job we made. This is my first race with team and they worked hard for us during the day. This motorcycle is a little different from mine, I've got another riding style, and I need to change it. We'll see what happens tomorrow."Massimo Roccoli (6th - 1'42.033 seconds - Yamaha Team Italia Lorenzini by Leoni)
"We experienced a lot of problems with traffic trying to set our fastest laps but I think that happened to a lot of riders. We also need to get the gearing sorted out better, especially between second and third gears."David Salom: (19th - 1'43.161 seconds - Yamaha Spain)
"We had some issues with the traffic today and when I tried to push hard another rider put me off line. But mainly we have to sort out the engine set-up to make it better under acceleration. Top power is OK. This is my preferred circuit, but things have been not as we expect. The most important thing is that I know that I can have a good rhythm."©Copyright Motorcycle Daily, LLC. All rights reserved. No part of this service may be reproduced, reprinted or republished in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without written permission from Motorcycle Daily, LLC.
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