Saturday Jun 17 2006
Qualifying Practices - Catalunya

Ducati Marlboro Team riders Loris Capirossi and Sete Gibernau were sixth and 13th quickest in this afternoon's tightly packed Catalan GP qualifying session, with just 1.014 seconds covering the quickest 15 riders.
Both men worked hard to get the best out of their Desmosedici GP6s in hot and humid conditions, World Championship leader Capirossi ending the day just 0.392 seconds off pole position after a scintillating final lap at the track where he won Ducati's first premier-class success in 2003. Gibernau, who qualified on pole position at Mugello two weeks ago, was 0.857 seconds down today but still confident that overnight set-up changes, following detailed analysis of his data from the day's two outings, could turn things around for his home race. The team is delighted with the progress made by Bridgestone at this difficult race, because even though the riders' grid positions aren't brilliant, their race pace isn't so bad.




LORIS CAPIROSSI, 6th fastest, 1m 42.247s
"Considering the way I rode that last lap, I think I deserved better than sixth place! But sixth means the second row and that's not so bad. We are still working on our bike set-up, it's more difficult than usual, and I'm pushing harder on the track, which means it's easy to make mistakes. There are other Bridgestone bikes faster than us, so we still have some improvements to make. Even so, I'm satisfied, not with our qualifying performance, but with the way we have worked so far. This morning I was the only guy who did 18 laps on race tyres and my lap times were pretty good. Bridgestone have made a very big step forward at this track. My best lap today would have given me pole last year and my race pace this morning would have put me on the podium last year. Obviously everyone has improved since then but while we were in real difficulties here last year, we are now in a position where we can do something. Anyway, we must believe in ourselves and I am determined as ever. Tomorrow I will give 100 per cent until the chequered flag."

SETE GIBERNAU, 13th fastest, 1m 42.712s
"Starting the race from so far back is going to make it hard for me. There's nothing we can do now about my grid position but I think we can do something for the race, because all the lap times are pretty close, so if we can get a good start and do some good laps, we could be okay, though it's definitely going to be hard. We've just got to keep our heads down and work something out for warm-up. I think we have a margin of improvement that I'm sure the team and myself will be able to work around and I'll also try and put something else into it. We are going to try quite a few things in the morning, a little bit of everything! It's more tough than usual here because it's my home race, I know my way around and I like the track, we just haven't been able to get me comfortable with the bike. I can't get into the corners the way I like to get into them, it's something in the balance of the bike that I can't work out. And because I'm getting into the corners bad, I'm also getting out of them bad. There's been talk of rain tomorrow but I hope not, I want a dry race."
Temperatures: Ambient: 28 degrees. Track: 46 degrees