Spies smashes best lap record with tenth Superpole

QUALIFYING 2 REPORT 03/10/2009 Spies smashes best lap record with tenth Superpole Ben Spies Yamaha World Superbike rider Ben Spies was back on form today, working up speed through the Superpole sessions to end the final heat with an incredible lap, smashing last year's record by nearly seven tenths and leaving the other qualifying riders nearly five tenths of a second behind. The ten poles by Spies mean he has now equaled Doug Polen's 1991 record for the number of pole position starts in a season. Spies also enjoyed a productive earlier qualifying session, continuing to fine tune the set up for tomorrow's two races, he ended in second behind Michel Fabrizio. Tom Sykes had worked solidly through qualifying, hitting ninth position by midway. As the session drew to a close he ended with a provisional 13th on the grid in advance of qualifying. An unfortunate crash in free practice in the afternoon session deprived him of his number one bike, throwing the British rider off balance for the Superpole heats. Despite the setback Sykes still made it through to the second Superpole session and will start tomorrow's two races from 14th position on the grid. Ben Spies, Yamaha World Superbike Team, (1st, 1'37.709) "The Superpole lap was a great lap, we've spent the weekend and the qualifying sessions working more on race tyres and fuel loads and really looking to make sure the bike is ready come Sunday. Superpole was the first time we really got down to banging out a lap and it was a good one. It's good to see Johnny is up there again, it's pretty much the same four guys as last time so it should be a good race. I don't think anybody is going to be getting away and I think it will be settled in the last few laps. I'm pretty confident with the bike so I'm happy going into Sunday." Tom Sykes Tom Sykes, Yamaha World Superbike Team (14th, 1'39.361) "It was a tough day today. We were making good progress in the qualifying session, and were finding improvements to the bike. Unfortunately in the free practice I had a very strange crash, I'm not sure why it happened at all. When we came out on the second bike the set up was completely different and so it was a struggle to get back on the pace. We don't have an ideal start position from the grid but if we can get off the line well, we can get in there and fight for the front." Massimo Meregalli, Yamaha World Superbike Team Manager " After yesterday we found some good improvements with the bike and Ben managed a really incredible lap, but most importantly we've found a really good set up for the race and our tyre choices are ready as well. Tomorrow will be a really tough race but we will be part of the front group and fighting for the win. Unfortunately Tom crashed during the free practice session and his second bike had a very different set up, so he didn't have as much confidence as with the first bike. He did his best and did manage to achieve the second qualifying session. It will be a tough race for him tomorrow but we know he will give it 100%." Circuit Length: 4411 Lap Record: 1'40.601 (Lorenzo Lanzi, 01/01/2005) Fastest Lap Ever: 1'37.709 (Ben Spies, 04/10/2009) Last Years Winner: Troy Bayliss 2009 WSB France - Magny-Cours 03/10/2009 Superpole Pos. Rider Manu. Nat. Total Time 1 Ben Spies Yamaha USA 1'37.709 2 Jonathan Rea Honda GBR 1'38.191 3 Michel Fabrizio Ducati ITA 1'38.196 4 Max Biaggi Aprilia ITA 1'38.235 5 Noriyuki Haga Ducati JPN 1'38.365 6 Leon Haslam Honda GBR 1'38.625 7 Fonsi Nieto Ducati ESP 1'38.670 8 Troy Corser BMW AUS 1'39.114 9 Shane Byrne Ducati GBR 1'38.831 10 Jakub Smrz Ducati CZE 1'38.844 11 Karl Muggeridge Suzuki AUS 1'38.851 12 Carlos Checa Honda ESP 1'38.924 13 Yukio Kagayama Suzuki JPN 1'39.148 14 Tom Sykes Yamaha GBR 1'39.361 15 Ruben Xaus BMW ESP 1'39.444 Qualifying 2 Pos. Rider Nat. QUAL I QUAL II 1 Michel Fabrizio ITA 1'38.770 1'38.349 2 Ben Spies USA 1'38.939 1'38.726 3 Noriyuki Haga JPN 1'38.877 1'38.726 4 Jonathan Rea GBR 1'38.821 1'38.792 5 Leon Haslam GBR 1'39.900 1'39.149 6 Fonsi Nieto ESP 1'39.772 1'39.158 7 Troy Corser AUS 1'39.435 1'39.317 8 Jakub Smrz CZE 1'39.613 1'39.358 9 Carlos Checa ESP 1'39.379 1'39.686 10 Shane Byrne GBR 1'40.534 1'39.411 11 Max Biaggi ITA 1'39.834 1'39.465 12 Yukio Kagayama JPN 1'39.497 1'39.566 13 Karl Muggeridge AUS 1'39.964 1'39.524 14 Tom Sykes GBR 1'40.048 1'39.620 15 Ruben Xaus ESP 1'40.375 1'39.682 21 David Checa ESP 1'40.554 1'40.418 QUALIFYING 1 REPORT 03/10/2009 Crutchlow snatches tenth pole in Magny Cours Cal Crutchlow 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 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." Circuit Length: 4411 Lap Record: 1'44.071 (Michel Fabrizio, 01/01/2005) Fastest Lap Ever: 1'40.980 (Cal Crutchlow, 04/10/2009) Last Years Winner: Andrew Pitt 2009 WSS France - Magny-Cours 03/10/2009

Qualifying 1

Pos.	Rider	Manu.	Nat.	Total Time
1	Cal Crutchlow	Yamaha	GBR	1'40.980
2	Joan Lascorz	Kawasaki	ESP	1'41.146
3	Kenan Sofuoglu	Honda	TUR	1'41.253
4	Eugene Laverty	Honda	GBR	1'41.562
5	Michele Pirro	Yamaha	ITA	1'41.720
6	Fabien Foret	Yamaha	FRA	1'41.943
7	Katsuaki Fujiwara	Kawasaki	JPN	1'41.956
8	Mark Aitchison	Honda	AUS	1'42.136
9	Andrew Pitt	Honda	AUS	1'42.176
10	Garry McCoy	Triumph	AUS	1'42.265
11	Matthieu Lagrive	Honda	FRA	1'42.571
12	Barry Veneman	Honda	NED	1'42.578
13	Miguel Praia	Honda	POR	1'42.580
14	Massimo Roccoli	Honda	ITA	1'42.648
15	Chaz Davies	Triumph	GBR	1'42.767
20	Dan Linfoot	Yamaha	GBR	1'44.025
22	Doni Tata Pradita	Yamaha	IDN	1'44.463
28	Yannick Guerra	Yamaha	ESP	1'45.567
29	Fabrice Auger	Yamaha	FRA	1'46.381

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