Rizla Suzuki Racer Loris Capirossi is prepared for a race-long battle at his home Grand Prix at Mugello tomorrow after qualifying on the fourth row today.
Capirossi (P12, 1’50.579, 25 laps) had a tough afternoon’s qualifying as a technical issue with his preferred Suzuki GSV-R forced him to use the other bike for most of the session. He persevered throughout qualifying and although he brought his times down, he was unable to be nearer the front of the grid and he will face a tough start tomorrow to fight his way through the pack.
Álvaro Bautista (P16, 1’53.243, 25 laps) is having his own personal battle this weekend as he fights through the pain to achieve at least a finish in Sunday’s race. He did manage to take over two seconds off his best time from yesterday during today’s qualifying, but will still start the 23-lap race from the rear of the grid as he continues to struggle with pain and lack of strength in his left shoulder.
Today’s qualifying was held in very warm and sunny conditions, with high air temperatures of 29ºC forcing track temperatures up to 52ºC. Dani Pedrosa took pole position on his factory Honda.
Tomorrow’s race is the fourth round of the 2010 season and the main event gets underway at 14.00hrs local time (12.00 GMT).
Loris Capirossi:
“It’s been tough today, because a setting we found this morning didn’t work at all in the warmer temperatures this afternoon and we had a little problem with one of the bikes and we couldn’t use it. Overall we tried very hard today, but it just didn’t happen, so we will need to do something in warm-up tomorrow to make things better. I am upset with my position on the grid, but I think I can do much better than that in the race tomorrow and I will be going full-out to show it!”
Álvaro Bautista:
“In this race I am fighting more with the pain than with other riders! I am still in a lot of pain and I can’t ride like I want to. I am not able to change direction quickly because I need more strength to do it quicker and I just don’t have that in my left side. I need to use all my body to change direction and this is very difficult and tiring. It is good that I can still ride though, I am three of four seconds off the pace but it is important to me to find some confidence and feeling in the bike. For the race I will do my best and try to finish. I need to get to the end of the race and get the full distance in and if that happens I might even manage to score some points.”
Paul Denning – Team Manager:
“After a promising start to the weekend yesterday, the qualifying result for Loris was massively disappointing today. We have a lot of work to do to get the bike in a better position to handle the hotter track temperatures that we had this afternoon, but this is Mugello, the rider is Loris and one thing we can guarantee is 23 laps of full effort from him tomorrow afternoon.
“Álvaro is very disappointed that his condition isn’t as good as he expected before the weekend. His strength hasn’t returned enough for him to push any harder and if he can see the chequered flag at the end of the Grand Prix tomorrow it will be a brave and somewhat painful effort!”
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