Kawasaki’s Tom Sykes topped the World Superbike time-sheets for the second time today, as he clinched provisional pole from Fixi Crescent Suzuki’s Leon Camier in this afternoon’s first qualifying practice session at Silverstone.
It was a near repeat performance of this mornings free practice, with Sykes quickest closely followed by Camier. This time it was no different, and even though the Huddersfield lad crashed at Copse Corner on his thirteenth lap with two minutes to go, he had already done enough to cement himself at the top of the qualifying practice timesheets with a 2’05.355 lap.
Sykes was over a second faster than Camier, who looked on course to better his fellow Briton, but he could not manage to out pace the Kawasaki, and had to settle on his best time of 2’06.236, which he clocked on his penultimate lap.
Sykes was not the only rider to fall foul of the tricky Northamptonshire track, Althea Racing’s Davide Giugliano crashed at Vale, but quickly rejoined the race and ended the session with a provisional front row start with a 2’06.332.
In the final minutes of qualifying practice, Pata Honda’s Jonathan Rea got the better of team-mate Leon Haslam to go fourth quickest, with Haslam rounding off the top five. The Smalley rider was as high as third fastest overall, but after spending some time in the pits he was not able to regain his good race pace to aim for a top three finish this afternoon.
Aprilia’s Eugene Laverty was two tenths of a second slower than Haslam, but was quicker than his team-mate Sylvain Guintoli who ended the session in ninth, with fellow Frenchman, Fixi Crescent Suzuki’s Jules Cluzel rounding off the top ten.
GoldBet BMW’s Chaz Davies, again could not make it inside the top ten fastest times, and had to settle for twelfth quickest, with his best time of 2’06.826. But the Welshman did improve his time by two seconds from his best lap that he clocked in the opening free practice session this morning.
