Yamaha World Superbike riders successfully completed today’s opener to the season showdown which took place in scorching sunshine at the Portuguese track of Portimao, on the infamous Algarve. Yamaha riders Eugene Laverty and Marco Melandri, intent on concluding the 2011 season in the best possible manner, got straight down to business to wind up the day in second and eighth places on the scoreboard.
Eugene Laverty, determined to keep a strong hold on his current third place in the championship standings, was quick off the mark as early as in the morning’s free practice session which he wrapped up in seventh position. After making some adjustments to the suspensions of his R1 machine prior to the afternoon’s first qualifying practice, the Northern Irish rider proceeded to lap the Portuguese track at a relatively fast pace, clocking in an impressive 1’43.666 towards the end to climb up to second, just 0.087 of a second behind World Champion, Checa and on a provisional front row on Sunday’s race grid.
Team-mate and fellow World Superbike rookie Melandri, worked hard today to get re-familiarized with the circuit which he first experienced just one month after his shoulder surgery, last January. The Italian spent the morning confronting different set-ups on the two R1s in search of suitable direction to work in. Despite the significant lack of rear grip, Melandri managed to make progress throughout the afternoon’s first qualifying session to end up in eighth place. Both Yamaha riders will continue to make adjustments and fine tune their machinery in tomorrow’s practice session ahead of the grand finale races on Sunday.
Eugene Laverty
Yamaha World Superbike Team – 2nd, 1’43.666
“It was a pretty good day today, similar to the first qualifying session in Magny Cours. I’ve tested the Superbike here already so I feel comfortable on it and it’s nice to be up to speed from the very start of the weekend and not have to be catching up gradually. The R1 is working well, we got good speed in but the lap times are dropping after just a few laps so we need to work on consistency for tomorrow. Hopefully our lap times should be ok to get through to Superpole and we’ll see what other changes to make in the morning.”
Marco Melandri
Yamaha World Superbike Team – 8th, 1’44.112
“It was a fairly tough day today. I was struggling with a lack of rear grip all day which we managed to improve slightly only with the softer tyres. We are not at all where I’d like to be at the end of the first day, but hopefully we can make good progress for tomorrow. We need to focus mainly on improving lap times with the race set up, as at the moment I am quite slow.”
Andrea Dosoli – Yamaha World Superbike Team Manager
“In general the day went quite well, having both riders provisionally in the front two rows. As we expected, Eugene was quick from the very first session, has a good pace with the race tyres and is just behind Checa using the softer tyres. He needs to work on the stability of his machine and improve in sectors where he is losing some time. We knew Marco had to use the first session to get familiar with the track and learn the lines but he made noticeable improvements by the afternoon’s session. He is fast with the soft tyres but the team need to work hard to improve the set-up to provide better rear grip on the race tyres and how the bike enters corners. We are confident that he will make further progress tomorrow and both riders can be at the front on Sunday.”
2011 World Superbike Portugal
Portimão 14/10/2011
1 Carlos Checa Ducati ESP 1’43.579
2 Eugene Laverty Yamaha GBR 1’43.666
3 Sylvain Guintoli Ducati FRA 1’43.860
4 Jonathan Rea Honda GBR 1’43.895
5 Max Biaggi Aprilia ITA 1’43.907
6 Joan Lascorz Kawasaki ESP 1’44.030
7 Tom Sykes Kawasaki GBR 1’44.111
8 Marco Melandri Yamaha ITA 1’44.112
9 Noriyuki Haga Aprilia JPN 1’44.144
10 Jakub Smrz Ducati CZE 1’44.201
11 Ayrton Badovini BMW ITA 1’44.278
12 Mark Aitchison Kawasaki AUS 1’44.410
13 Leon Haslam BMW GBR 1’44.426
14 Leon Camier Aprilia GBR 1’44.598
15 Troy Corser BMW AUS 1’44.631
Circuit Length:
4692
Temp:
44
Weather:
Very Hot
Fastest Lap Ever:
1’42.092
(Cal Crutchlow, 3/28/2010)
Last Years Winner:
Max Biaggi
