Althea Ducati's Carlos Checa was chased hard by reigning World Superbike Champion Max Biaggi in the first free practice session at Misano with the Spaniard only 0.011s ahead of the Italian as the pair duked it out with their final laps.
With only a handful of minutes left to run, Checa was enjoying a lead of three-quarters of a second over the Alitalia Aprilia man but Biaggi sliced that down to a gnat's by the time the chequered flag was waved. A late charge by Troy Corser saw him jump to third and relegate team-mate Leon Haslam, who yesterday announced he and wife Oli are with expecting, to fourth. The BMW pair are 0.6 and 0.7s in arrears.
Biaggi's team-mate Leon Camier is fifth and a little under a second off the pace after being second fastest earlier on. The top five riders have all tested at Misano recently. Ayrton Badovini stuck in a late lap to bag sixth which deposed Alstare Suzuki's Michel Fabrizio while Sylvain Guintoli took eighth ahead of his Liberty Ducati team-mate Jakub Smrz, who sat in fourth until the final ten minutes.
Yamaha's Marco Melandri is tenth fastest and 1.3s off the pace while Castrol Honda's Jonathan Rea is struggling in 12th behind Maxime Berger. PBM Kawasaki's Tom Sykes in 13th, team-mate Joan Lascorz 14th and Noriuyki Haga 15th.
