Kawasaki’s Tom Sykes had to play second fiddle to his team-mate Loris Baz at the World Superbike qualifying session at Assen this afternoon. The Frenchman was nearly a second faster than the Brit and ended up snatching pole, leaving Sykes starting from third – but still on the front row.
Sykes narrowly missed the chance to set a fast lap as the rain arrived with a few minutes of Superpole two still to go. But, like Baz he is confident of his chances on race day no matter the weather conditions, after making real progress in the wet during a test at Jerez, shortly before the previous round at Aragon.
“We timed it well to get our race laps and qualifying laps in but the rain came a little bit too early for us in Superpole. It is a shame because I feel the qualifying tyre is my favourite one of the weekend because we really get to push the limits of the Ninja ZX-10R,” said Sykes
“Loris did a great job and he is starting on his first pole position but for us I think a front row start is what we need to be focusing on. Tomorrow hopefully we will get a good start and go racing twice and see what we can make of it. We will wake up tomorrow morning and see what we are blessed with for weather.
"Either way we will go racing. We are racing in a world championship and fighting for a world title so if it is wet or dry we are going to have to deal with it. Either way I feel we have a strong package with both myself and the bike. Things are working well over race distance here and tomorrow if it is wet then we will adjust the Ninja ZX-10R accordingly.”
