Saturday Jul 22 2006
Superpole

Brno (Czech Republic), Saturday 22 July: Lorenzo Lanzi and Troy Bayliss will start tomorrow's seventh round of the World Superbike Championship at Brno from the front row of the grid after setting third and fourth quickest times in the Superpole session behind poleman Noriyuki Haga (Yamaha) and James Toseland (Honda). Italian Lanzi was just a fraction ahead of his Australian team-mate in the one-lap dash, but the two Ducati Xerox riders are confident they will be front-runners tomorrow.

"I hope I have a chance to get on the podium in both races but it's going to be tough" commented Lorenzo Lanzi. "Today was a very difficult day because at one point in Superpole it looked as if it was going to rain and that would have changed things a lot. My Superpole lap was almost perfect, and I am very satisfied with third place on the grid. Tomorrow for the race, the first laps will be difficult but I have a good race pace and I hope to be able to be amongst the leaders. A big thanks to all my fans for coming, I don't know where they will be around the race track but I hope to give them something to cheer about tomorrow!"




"It's been a little bit different this weekend but its all coming together now" declared Troy Bayliss. "The lap I did today was far from perfect but I'm reasonably happy because I'm on the front of the grid and that's very important round here. Of course its going to be a very long hard race tomorrow, hopefully the weather will be fine but I'm really happy for Lorenzo and all his fans here and hope he can do a good job for himself and the team. The last tests here we did a full race simulation and it all went very well, basically I'll be on the same tyre tomorrow but honestly after ten laps here everybody's in the same boat and you're just going to have to hang in there to the end."

TIMES: 1. Haga (Yamaha) 2m00.457s; 2. Toseland (Honda) 2m01.056s; 3. Lanzi (Ducati Xerox) 2m01.073s; 4. Bayliss (Ducati Xerox) 2m01.207s; 5. Corser (Suzuki) 2m01.351s; 6. Kagayama (Suzuki) 2m01.453s; 7. Pitt (Yamaha) 2m01.482s; 8. Muggeridge (Honda) 2m01.498s; 9. Laconi (Kawasaki) 2m01.620s; 10. Nieto (Kawasaki) 2m01.799s.

TV COVERAGE: Eurosport (Pan European): Sunday 23 July - 1200 SBK race 1 (live); Eurosport 2 (Pan European): Saturday 22 July - 1600 Superpole (live), Sunday 23 July - 1530 SBK race 2 (live). La7 (Italy): Sunday 23 July - 1430 SBK race 1 (delayed) + race 2 (live).