Yamaha World Superbike Team riders Eugene Laverty and Marco Melandri experienced their first ever Superpole shoot-out this afternoon at the Phillip Island International circuit in Australia. The adrenalin fuelled short ‘qualifying heats’ quickly sort the fastest riders from the pack to decide the grid line up for Sunday’s two World Superbike races, the first of the 2011 season.

Laverty continued to display the consistent form fans have seen since he first jumped on the Yamaha R1 race bike, flying through the first, second and third Superpole heats in fifth place, earning himself a second row start for his first ever World Superbike race tomorrow.

Teammate and fellow World Superbike Superpole rookie Melandri was enjoying a much better day than yesterday. The Italian rider had clearly improved his set up from the day before, although was experiencing the stickier Superpole qualifier tyres for the first time this afternoon. Melandri cleared the first session in 11th place, then hung on in the second in eighth to make it through to the final session. Having used all his qualifiers in the first two sessions he couldn’t improve on his time but held on for a second row start for what is also his first ever World Superbike race.

Eugene Laverty, Yamaha World Superbike Team - 5th, 1’31.858

“So far so good! I’ve really been enjoying the weekend so far; everything seems to be running really smoothly. We’re still working on our set up for race distance but for the faster laps in qualifying it seems to have worked well. Superpole was a new experience for me, the qualifying tyres require quite a different style of riding so I think I’m yet to get the best out of them. Bring on tomorrow, I’m ready and really excited about seeing what we can do, I just hope it doesn’t rain!”

Marco Melandri, Yamaha World Superbike Team - 8th, 1’32.662

“Yesterday was a bad day for me, today was better but still difficult! The Superpole event was new for me, so I’m happy to be on the second row at the end. I really like it, it’s like having three times qualifying so it’s pretty nice. It was pretty tough initially as I’ve never tried the qualifying tyres before, so I had no time to get used to the way they feel. I’m more confident for the races now so we will see what happens tomorrow.”