During Friday's free practice, Yamaha took six of the first seven qualifying places for Superpole 2, with only Ayrton Badovini managing to surreptitiously slip his MV Agusta into fourth position. Jules Cluzel confirmed his current great form with the best time, ahead of Championship leader Sandro Cortese and Randy Krummenacher. Lucas Mahias was sixth, more than half a second behind Cluzel.
This Saturday, Superpole 1 saw Hikari Okubo and Kyle Smith qualify, joining the ten drivers already selected on Friday.
During the first part of Superpole 2, the first fast time was to the credit of Randy Krummenacher in 2'403.274, 0.003 ahead of Sandro Cortese, who preceded Raffaele de Rosa, Jules Cluzel and Lucas Mahias. Then everyone returned to the pits, except Mahias who completed a second timed lap which allowed him to move up to fourth position (0.7 behind Krummenacher).
The big sprint started on new tires 5 minutes from the checkered flag. Sandro Cortese improved the best performance in 2'02.670, 0.604 ahead of Krummenacher and 0.653 ahead of Cluzel. Raffaele de Rosa fourth fell without seriousness. Lucas Mahias could not take advantage of this and had to settle for fifth position, 1.001 behind Cortese, ahead of his teammate Federico Caricasulo in sixth.
Cluzel will therefore start this Sunday from the first row and Mahias from the second, but the big gap of 0.6 opened up for pole position by Sandro Cortese can only be a small source of concern for the two Frenchmen.
Qualification results:
Reference times:
Test record: 2'02.060 by Cal Crutchlow (Yamaha) in 2009
Lap record: 2'02.708 by Cal Crutchlow (Yamaha) in 2009
Provisional ranking of the World Championship:
1 Sandro Cortese 102 points
2 Jules Cluzel 95
3 Randy Krummenacher 94
4 Lucas Mahias 90
5 Federico Caricasulo 79
6 Raffaele De Rosa 67
7 Niki Tuuli 39
8 Ayrton Badovini 33
9 Anthony West 32
10 Thomas Gradinger 31
Photos © worldsbk.com
