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A determined Fabrizio to start from third on tomorrow’s grid at Misano

Round 8 Misano, Italy
Sunday 26th June 2010

This afternoon at the Misano World Circuit, Ducati Xerox rider Michel Fabrizio fought until the final seconds of a Superpole characterised by very hot conditions. The Italian rider closed today in third position and his team, after two days of intense work, are extremely satisfied to be on the front row for tomorrow’s races. With respect to yesterday’s qualifying session, times improves dramatically for the Ducati Xerox riders in second qualifying this morning, with Noriyuki improving on his best time by over a second and Michel by six tenths. Despite this improvement, overall positions at the end of qualifying remained almost as they were yesterday evening, with Fabrizio qualifying for the afternoon’s Superpole in fourth position and Noriyuki in twelfth. Michel found a better level of grip by using Ducati’s “traditional” rear tyre used in all the races up until now, while Noriyuki continued to struggle slightly with a lack of traction.

Superpole 1: in the first phase of today’s Superpole both Ducati Xerox riders exited first on race tyres. Michel only needed to make this exit, registering a fast enough time (1m35.8) to close the phase in second position overall, while Noriyuki went back out on a qualifier, to record the eighth fastest time.

Superpole 2: two different strategies for the riders this time, with Michel confident that he could record a fast time with the race tyre and Noriyuki opting straight for the second available qualifier. Although satisfied with the initial time recorded, Fabrizio decided together with his race engineer to test the new qualifier that Pirelli had brought, and finishing the session with the fourth fastest time. Noriyuki was less fortunate, making a small error during his fast lap which left him in ninth position, just a hundredth of a second from eighth placed Scassa.

Superpole 3: Roman rider Fabrizio went out first with the new qualifier and then with a race tyre, to finish this final phase in third position, satisfied with a place on the front row of tomorrow’s grid.

Michel Fabrizio

  

Michel Fabrizio  “I’m very happy to be starting on the front row, although tomorrow’s races will still be tough. We have a good race pace but the racing will nevertheless be difficult, especially in the initial stages. In the Superpole I was faster with the race tyre and all went well; it’s only a shame that there was a moment of confusion after the session concluded, Corser made contact with the bike and I ended up on the ground. Anyway everything’s ok, although there was some damage to my bike, and I’m hopeful ahead of tomorrow. I’d like to have two great races in front of the “home” crowd of course. I also want to thank my team for all their hard work this weekend.”

Noriyuki Haga

  

Noriyuki Haga  “Of course I’m disappointed with today’s Superpole result, I missed out on entry into the last phase by just a fraction of a second. I wasn’t able to find a good rhythm with the qualifiers and even though we made some small changes to my bike during the day, I didn’t feel any big difference as I had hoped to. Having said that, I think we have a good set up for tomorrow’s races and I’m happy with the choice of tyres we have made. We’ll see tomorrow.”

TIMES (Superpole)
  1. Corser (BMW) 1m35.0
  2. Biaggi (Aprilia) 1m35.5
  3. Fabrizio (Ducati Xerox) 1m35.6
  4. Crutchlow (Yamaha) 1m35.6
  5. Checa (Ducati) 1m35.8
  6. Guintoli (Suzuki) 1m36.0
  7. Haslam (Suzuki) 1m36.3
  8. Scassa (Ducati) 1m36.6
  9. Haga (Ducati Xerox) 1m36.0
  10. Smrz (Ducati) 1m36.1