The first day of practice and qualifying for Sunday’s World Superbike ninth round at Brno in the Czech Republic turned out a difficult one for Team Suzuki Alstare riders Leon Haslam and Sylvain Guintoli.
Similar problems to the ones they had on day one at Misano and a lack of grip caused Guintoli to end the day 15th fastest, with Haslam two places back in 17th. But, just like Misano, the track’s grip is improving as more sessions take place and the team has identified today’s problems and will make changes to the settings tomorrow and will hopefully be back in contention again.
Noriyuki Haga (Ducati) was fastest in qualifying with a lap of 1:59.277, with Cal Crutchlow (Yamaha) second. Michel Fabrizio (Ducati) was third quickest, with Carlos Checa (Ducati) fourth.
Sylvain Guintoli – 15th, 2:00.739:
“I love this track, so it’s disappointing to only be 15th at the end of the day. But the problem is that we couldn’t get any grip out of the track today. The morning was bad, but it did get a bit better this afternoon and I have a feeling that it is going to get better and better over the weekend. We had this problem at Misano and it was frustrating, but we did improve then and I think we’ll improve more and more tomorrow and the next day. We definitely need more side-grip and hopefully we’ll get that as the track improves. The situation is not desperate, but it was pretty frustrating today. I feel that our base setting is good, so all we have to do is to make the tyres work for us.”
Leon Haslam– 17th, 2:01.003
“It was not an easy day for us, but the bottom line is that we think we have identified what happened and know what we can do to the bike to improve it. We had a big problem with grip today and although it was better in the afternoon, if you got off line, the track still felt pretty slippery. Like Misano, I sort of think that our problems today are a combination of new tyres, some problems sorting which way to go with the anti-braking system and the lack of track grip. We’ve had a long, hard look at the telemetry and we know what we’re going to do with the bike tomorrow, so that’s a good and positive way to end the day.
Friday qualifying: 1 Noriyuki Haga (JPN-Ducati) 1:59.277, 2 Cal Crutchlow (GBR-Yamaha) 1:59.571, 3 Michel Fabrizio (ITA-Ducati) 1:59.730, 4 Carlos Checa (ESP-Ducati) 2:00.153, 5 Max Biaggi (ITA-Aprilia) 2:00.174, 6 Ruben Xaus (ESP-BMW) 2:00.273, 15 Sylvain Guintoli (FRA-Suzuki Alstare) 2:00739, 17 Leon Haslam (GBR-Suzuki Alstare) 2:01.003.
