Ducati’s Chaz Davies' previous track experience from his days racing in the AMA has paid off, as the Welshman edged ahead of the Aprilia pairing of Sylvain Guintoli and Marco Melandri to head the World Superbike timesheets during the final timed free practice session at Laguna Seca this afternoon.
Davies pulverised the lap record by half a second, and even had a one tenth advantage over Guintoli and Melandri. But the beginning of FP3 started with red flags. They were out in force after five minutes, as Red Devils Roma rider Toni Elias crashed at the Corkscrew (see below). The former MotoGP rider, who has buckets of experience out on the circuit, was declared OK at the trackside.
Once the red flags disappeared Davies was well and truly on the pace and a 1’23.293 placed him right at the top of the timing-screens pushing Sykes to second with 35 minutes remaining – going two tenths faster than the Kawasaki man.
Soon the Aprilia’s were back in force attacking their way into the top three, with both Melandri and Guintoli setting similar lap times. But Davies proved to be unstoppable and was a tenth faster than the duelling pair to end the session on provisional pole.
Kawasaki’s Tom Sykes was not able to better his lap time from FP2, and stayed on 1’23.462, but slipped back to fourth. Voltcom Suzuki’s Alex Lowes was dangerously close to going into Superpole one, as he was hovering around the top ten spot for nearly all of the session. But a fast last lap dash from the circuit rookie pushed him to fifth – with a 1’23.573, going nearly a second quicker than the previous outing.
Lowes had an extra tenth over his team-mate, Eugene Laverty who had to settle for sixth fastest overall on the combined timessheets. Another circuit debutant, Pata Honda’s Jonathan Rea edged ahead of his team-mate Leon Haslam, by three tenths – with a 1’23.638, which put him seventh quickest.
Ducati’s Davide Giugliano couldn’t emulate his team-mate’s fast pace, but did enough to sneak into Superpole two, with Elias rounding off the top ten. Kawasaki’s Loris Baz failed to make it straight into Superpole two, and for the first time this season has to go through Superpole one to see if he will have another opportunity to challenge for a front row start.
Alstare’s Christian Iddon did improve on his lap time by over half a second, but it was still not enough for the Evo rider to go through to Superpole two. Leon Camier went a second quicker than his FP2 time, to push his Reparto Corse to 18th overall – but has to battle it out in Superpole one tomorrow.
Entrants for Superpole two:
Davies
Guintoli
Melandri
Sykes
Lowes
Laverty
Rea
Haslam
Giugliano
Elias
