The Yamaha World Supersport team made a promising start to Saturday's opening round of the 2007 Supersport World Championship at a hot and sunny Losail circuit in Qatar today, ending first qualifying with both riders on the provisional second row. Last year's championship runner-up Kevin Curtain was the fastest of the YZF-R6 runners, setting a best lap of 2:03.941 around the long and fast desert circuit. Team-mate Broc Parkes was just five hundreds of a second behind his fellow Australian to take eighth place in a tight session that saw the top eight all in the 2:03 bracket. Encouragingly both of the Yamaha Motor Europe entered machines were able to run consistently at race pace, putting in consistent 2:04 lap times during their runs.
The season certainly got off to a spectacular start when Curtain's R6 was destroyed in a pile-up just minutes into the morning practice session. The accident claimed four Yamaha riders with Yamaha GMT94's David Checa and Sebastien Gimbert, as well as Italian privateer Gianluca Vizziello, all going down on oil deposited by another rider's machine. Thankfully all riders escaped without injury and were able to return to the circuit when the session was restarted, allowing the protagonists to work on finding a good set-up for Saturday's 18 lap race.
Yamaha Motor Italy Lorenzini by Leoni rider Massimo Roccoli ended the day 11th on his YZF-R6, with supersport newcomer Gimbert and team-mate Checa ending the day 17th and 21st places respectively. Fastest man on show was Japanese rider Katsuaki Fujiwara (Honda) who recorded a 2:03.258 lap in the last minute of the session. Italian Gianluca Nannelli (Ducati) and Honda team-mates Kenan Sofuoglu and Sebastien Charpentier complete the provisional front row.
Kevin Curtain"Not a bad day but the crash this morning was a real downer. Someone blew up right on the racing line and four of us went down, with Broc and a few others doing real well to stay up. The bike was totally destroyed in the crash and that set me back as the spare bike wasn't set up quite the same. That's a shame but we know we are competitive and can make some improvements for tomorrow."
Broc Parkes"It's been a decent enough start today. I almost crashed on the oil in the morning session and the two big delays were a little strange. The times are all very close and we're on the pace. I think that we are already in decent shape but hopefully we can get further up the grid tomorrow."
Circuit Length: 5380
Temp: 25
Weather: Dry
Qualifying 1 - 2007 WSS Qatar 22/02/2007: 1 Katsuaki Fujiwara Honda JPN 2'3.258
2 Gianluca Nannelli Ducati ITA 2'3.477
3 Kenan Sofuoglu Honda TUR 2'3.608
4 Sebastien Charpentier Honda FRA 2'3.744
5 Fabien Foret Kawasaki FRA 2'3.862
6 Kevin Curtain Yamaha AUS 2'3.941
7 Pere Riba Kawasaki ESP 2'3.949
8 Broc Parkes Yamaha AUS 2'3.991
9 Robbin Harms Honda DNK 2'4.308
10 Barry Veneman Suzuki NED 2'4.484
11 Massimo Roccoli Yamaha ITA 2'4.953
12 Davide Giugliano Kawasaki ITA 2'5.054
13 Yoann Tiberio Honda FRA 2'5.399
14 Vesa Kallio Suzuki FIN 2'5.450
15 Javier Fores Honda ESP 2'5.456
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