At the ninth round of the 2015 FIM Superbike World Championship Tom Sykes and his KRT team-mate Jonathan Rea qualified fourth and fifth respectively to earn second row grid slots for Sunday’s two 25-lap races.

In warm and dry conditions Sykes and Rea eased into the second Superpole contest after regular qualifying had been completed. Neither KRT rider was able to match the single lap pace of some of their rivals but each is confident that the work they put in to prepare for the heat of battle will pay dividends on raceday.

Sykes had been second and Rea fourth on the combined time sheets to earn their Superpole 2 places and each rider used the free practice session to make final set-up choices before going for their ultimate grid positions.

For Sykes, who won a race at Laguna Seca last year, the arrival of a qualifying rear tyre in Superpole promised much but he felt he could not get the best out of the increased grip levels. He will now start the races from the head of the second row at the intense 3.610km circuit near Monterey.

It was a case of working on race set-up and making a strong race simulation for Rea in the third qualifying session, before he set his fifth place time in Superpole 2. He now starts from the middle of the second row as he goes to extend his championship lead on raceday.



Tom Sykes:

“We have been working on race performance all weekend and at this circuit, for whatever reason, the grip has been low. Not only for me but for everybody. When I put the qualifying tyre in the bike in Superpole it did some really nice things but I have to hold my hands up because I do not think I took the best from the package. The level of performance was much better than it was with the race tyre so it was really rider error and I am sorry for the team. It was difficult for me to react quickly because it is a short track and we only had one really good lap on the Q tyre. We had a little bit of a stumbling block in free practice four, which made us play a little bit conservative for Superpole, so that also did not help for us. But being on the front of the second row is not the end of the world. After practice and qualifying we have some good information for raceday. Tomorrow we can work on something a little bit extra in warm-up before the races.”

Jonathan Rea:

“We have been working really hard for the races and tomorrow is the day we score points. It is going to be a race of two halves, I think, because the first part will be queued up. This is a hard track to pass at so we need to get a good position in the early laps and find our rhythm. The last part of the race is going to decide who wins because there should be some guys going forward and some guys going backward. I just hope I am one of the guys going forward. We did a race simulation and I tried to put 20 consistent laps together, so we got some good information. Our bike is not using up tyres so much and Paolo my electronics guy has got our traction control and mapping really sorted. Track position is important here so a clean getaway tomorrow is at the top of the shopping list.”

David Salom (Kawasaki Team Pedercini) automatically qualified for Superpole 2 and ended up 11th on the grid. Roman Ramos (Team Go Eleven Kawasaki) was 16th after Superpole 1.