1st – Noriyuki Haga Speaks…
"You can see that I’m back in shape after the holidays and I’m very happy to have taken the pole today. It’s my first pole position with Ducati and it comes just at the right time, as the championship reaches the final stages. I’ve been feeling comfortable on the bike all weekend and this bodes well for tomorrow. I like the track a lot and, having gone well here last year, I’m looking forward to racing."
2nd – Jonathan Rea Speaks…
I put a pretty good lap in at the start of the last Superpole session and thought it would be enough. But all credit to Nori – it was a really good lap on a not exactly 100% qualifying tyre. But my package was working really well and I’m glad the guys didn’t go to sleep during the summer break. We’ve come here with some really good development parts for the bike and I can’t thank the boys enough for digging deep. I really love this circuit but didn’t ride so well in the Supersport race here last year but this is a new year and I think our race package is pretty good. I can sleep solidly tonight and really look forward to tomorrow.
3rd – Leon Haslam Speaks…
"I am really happy with my results today. I had a very good summer break, and then to come back to the championship and put the machine on the front row is just fantastic. I will be starting from the front row for the first time this season so I am over the moon. I am really looking forward to racing tomorrow. I had a good wet practice on Friday and after today’s results I am feeling really confident I can ride a good race tomorrow."
4th – Michel Fabrizio Speaks…
"I am fairly happy with the result; it’s just a shame I made a small mistake on the last corner because I think if I had nailed that I could have finished second or third. Anyway the important thing is that I’m starting from the front row and I am more than ready to fight for the win tomorrow. I predict a close battle between us on the Ducatis and the two Hondas."
5th – Ben Spies Speaks…
"I didn’t do us any favours by falling in the second practice and missing out on valuable track time, so we’re still looking for the right set up. We seem to be struggling a bit for grip on the bumpy sections and that’s what we’re trying to deal with. Combine that with the rain when we arrived and the lost time in free practice means we’ve only really had an hour of dry time here to find our set up. We’ve got the warm up and two races to figure it out so we’re on it."
7th – Max Biaggi Speaks…
"We worked very hard – Biaggi said – the bike is very nervous and difficult to manage. The fact that we haven’t ridden it on the dry track certainly didn’t make it easy for us to find the best setting for the RSV4. Now we are going better step by step. The races of tomorrow will be very hard and I have to push harder and harder to get a good result".
8th – Carlos Checa Speaks…
We changed a little bit for the last run and I thought I would be able to do a low 56 or even a high 55, but it did not come. I am pretty happy with the race tyre, though and the package is feeling good, even though I am still struggling a little in the first sector. I wasn’t feeling so good today – a headache and maybe a little temperature. So we’ll hope for more tomorrow, both from me and the bike.
9th – Tom Sykes Speaks…
"we’ve been up in the top five all weekend and feeling really good in the dry and the wet but when it came to using the Qualifier in the second heat of Superpole it felt wrong. It felt like a used race tyre when I went out, so I thought I’d try another lap. I improved on my lap time but it didn’t feel remotely like a Qualifier tyre. On the third lap I was undecided whether to come in or not and couldn’t see a timer anywhere. By the time I got back it was too late to get out again which was really frustrating. It’s a shame as I certainly felt like we could have been front row tomorrow for the start. Still, we’ve got a good race pace and it’s a long race so we’ll see what we can do."
18th – Ryuichi Kiyonari Speaks…
I am very disappointed with today’s qualifying sessions and Superpole because yesterday it felt like we were making some good progress with the bike and I had a good feeling in the wet. Today in the dry the feeling was not so good and I’m not so sure what we can do to improve things. But we will look at everything again later to see where we can improve the bike and maybe the rider. Of course, I will try my best in tomorrow’s races and hope for a better result than today.
19th – John Hopkins Speaks…
"I had some minor technical problems that kept me in the garage a lot. I could not put as many consistent laps as I would have wanted to. Without that consistence it was hard to push for a good lap time. It left us too far behind from where we would like to be. Leon has shown what the bike is capable of and has definitely set the bench mark. I will try to get into a good rhythm in the warm-up sessions and try to get off the line as best as possible to improve the situation we are in now."