Be Wiser Ducati's Shane Byrne will start from fifth on the grid for the opening MCE British Superbike race at Thruxton after a late setup change failed to pay off for the reigning champion.
Byrne and his crew tweaked the Panigale during Superpole this afternoon but the Kent man was unable to find the 1'14s pace has was able to achieve in qualifying one.
Byrne's best Superpole lap was a respectable 1'15.193 and he shares the second row with Tyco BMW's Christian Iddon and Honda Racing's Dan Linfoot. Byrne admitted that this weekend has been 'difficult' and came in to the seventh round of the series full of optimism.
Last year he set the outright lap record of a 1'13.843, and the Ducati has improved since 2016, but he was unable to match those times today.
"It has been a really difficult weekend and we had a really good run with the bike over the last few tracks," said Byrne.
"We came here expecting better things from last year. The bike in theory has improved a bit. Riding the thing at the minute has been difficult.
"We made a change to the bike in that Superpole lap which in hindsight it could have waited for until tomorrow morning and I am really, really frustrated.
Byrne is also £250 out of pocket after he was fined by race direction for being late to the Superpole arch. The top nine riders have to be at the arch for the start of their one lap dash by a certain time and Byrne was 19 seconds too late to the Superpole area and he was not a happy man this evening.
"I am pretty pissed off about it. Maybe they need some money for dinner tonight,” he growled.
