The first day of action for round two of the 2016 FIM Superbike World Championship has drawn to a close at Chang International Circuit in Thailand for the Honda WorldSBK Team. At the end of Friday’s two free practice sessions, Michael van der Mark sat on top of the timesheets, while Nicky Hayden claimed a very encouraging sixth place in what was his very first day of riding at the Thai venue. Both riders will spearhead Honda’s attack for pole position tomorrow directly from Superpole 2.

Michael van der Mark took a safe approach to the morning session, given the less-than-ideal conditions of the track. As free practice one progressed and the asphalt gained more grip and cleaned up, the 23-year-old Dutchman got up to speed aboard his Honda CBR1000RR Fireblade SP, eventually ending up fourth. In the afternoon, the 2014 WorldSSP Champion and his crew managed to make an important step forward in terms of bike setup, which translated in the first place in the combined times courtesy of an impressive 1’34.629s lap-time.

Nicky Hayden spent most of the first part of the morning session learning his way around the circuit. He and the team were able to immediately find a good base set-up for his Fireblade machine as the American elevated himself to second place; a result that could have been even better without a small mistake at the last turn, during his final attempt before the chequered flag. Despite a small technical problem encountered in free practice two, Hayden was able to bounce back in the final stages of the session to claim sixth place.

After a 15-minute third free practice session scheduled at 10:45 local time (GMT+7), the second round Superpole 2 and race one will get underway at 13:55 and 16:00, respectively.

Michael van der Mark 60 - 1st/1'34.629

I’m very happy with how today has been. In the morning, the track was quite dirty so I decided not to take any unnecessary risks at the beginning. It was almost impossible to be consistent given the conditions, but obviously it was the same for everyone. In the end I was able to make up some positions, although the result was not exactly what I was looking for. We made a lot of changes to the bike before the afternoon and from the first moment I felt much more comfortable. Later on, we made another big change that turned out to be a good one and then the fast laps started to come. With some small further adjustments, we were able to move up to first place on the final lap and that was it. As I said I’m really happy and looking forward to tomorrow morning; we will use this little time to focus more on our race pace.

Nicky Hayden 69 - 6th/1'35.344

This morning, the track was a bit dirty but it is something that happens at venues where there isn’t constant racing going on throughout the year. We got up to speed fairly quick and kept improving throughout the session but a small mistake on the last lap did not allow me to take first place. In the afternoon we kept the used tyres from the previous session on, trying to get a few laps in and see how I’d feel. As the session went on we went for new tyres. Obviously I’m a little disappointed for that small mistake in the morning and even this afternoon I’d have hoped to make an even bigger step forward, but things were generally pretty smooth. We just had a small problem with a sensor on the bike that cost us a little bit of time, but overall to be sixth at a brand new track cannot be considered a poor result. We got what we wanted, we’re in Superpole 2 and now it’s all about keeping on improving, qualifying well and to be ready for the races.

Pieter Breddels - Technical Manager

Michael had an impressive day today, especially in the second session. In the morning he did not really push because of track conditions, but as the asphalt cleaned up and got more grip he started to get up to speed. We didn’t do anything too clever with the bike setup, just normal adjustments that proved to be very effective. He was very quick, especially in the last sector and that is a very good sign, if we think of the difficulties we encountered here a year ago. Nicky had a great start this morning and in the afternoon we managed to work on the bike a bit more, in terms of gearing and geometries. A sixth place is definitely a positive result and we have some good ideas to improve more tomorrow. We will also compare the data coming from Michael’s side, which surely will help. It has been a great start to the weekend; now we need to build upon these performances and get ready for race action.