Team Suzuki Alstare’s Michel Fabrizio narrowly missed a second row grid position for tomorrow’s British round of the World Superbike Championship at Donington Park during today’s Final Qualifying and Superpole.
The Italian is happy with his central position on the grid and will start the 23-lap races from the third row, confident of getting a good start in both.
Conditions were very different to yesterday, with freezing cold temperatures and overcast skies replacing yesterday’s sunshine; and a track surface that remained below 7 Degrees.
Current series leader Carlos Checa (Ducati) put in a flyer of a lap in Superpole 3 to take his second Pole of the year, nearly three-tenths-of-a-second ahead of his nearest rival Leon Haslam (BMW).
Michel Fabrizio – 11th, 1:29.135:
“Considering that I ended 17th fastest yesterday, I guess you could say that 11th today is a good improvement. But of course, I would’ve preferred a place on the second row of the grid because that would have made the starts a little easier. Now I will have to make sure I make good starts in both races to be able to fight with the leaders. It feels a bit like a funnel going into turn one, so I definitely do not want to get held up entering the turn. It’s going to be a bit hectic for sure, but I certainly want to be in the top six by the time I exit the turn.
“Today’s conditions were very different to yesterday and it was very cold indeed. That didn’t seem to affect our grip level though, so we were able to concentrate of finding a good set-up for the bike. At the moment we are not quite there yet, but we have improved a lot since the first session yesterday.
“The feeling of the bike in Superpole 2 was good. It is this that we want to build on for the races, so we will try a few little things in the warm-up tomorrow. The difference in lap times from Pole to me are pretty small, so I don’t think anybody is going to clear off and easily win the races. There are going to be some big battles tomorrow and I am really looking forward to them.”
Friday WSB Qualifying: 1 Carlos Checa (ESP-Ducati) 1:28.099, 2 Leon Haslam (GBR-BMW) 1:28.365, 3 Tom Sykes (GBR-Kawasaki) 1:28.556, 4 Jakub Smrz (CZE-Ducati) 1:28.561, 5 Noriyuki Haga (JPN-Aprilia) 1:28.673, 6 Max Biaggi (ITA-Aprilia). 11 Michel Fabrizio (ITA-Suzuki Alstare) 1:29.135.
