Kent’s Leon Camier could be the man to watch in today’s World Superbike races from Assen as he starts from the back of the grid.
The Ashford born rider was unable to take part in the second part of qualifying due to technical issues, meaning that not only did he miss the Superpole but he will start the races today from 19th and last place.
Camier has shown that he is quick all weekend despite not being full fit to ride after an accident two weeks ago, so he could make a charge from the back in the two races.
Speaking about his weekend, a frustrated Leon said: “”Considering how many laps I’ve done – and that last session was only a few – I was actually quite happy to be ninth quickest in the free practice and be only 0.6 seconds off the fastest time.
“It feels like I’m not meant to ride this weekend, with the way things have gone, but I still have the races to come! We have some options for settings and we’re not sure which way to go. We have one that I normally run and another that I have been trying which we think has some potential, so we will need to look at things and make the decision; but from last on the grid there is not a lot I can do and it will be pretty difficult to get a good result.
“I have to see if my knee can stand up to race distance as well though, because I’ve only done four laps at the maximum before it has started hurting. I don’t know if I can do the whole race or not, but I’ll give it my best and just have to see what happens.”
His teammate Jules Cluzel also missed out on the Superpole three session in qualifying yesterday, but despite some impressive laps in Superpole one, a mistake on his final run in Superpole two cost him dear and he could only manage 10th place.
However the Frenchman is in a good position to improve on that during the race and score some good points for the team in the two races today.
Giving his reaction to his qualifying performance Cluzel said: “”I am a little bit disappointed because I think it was possible to be in Superpole 3. I made a couple of mistakes with the qualifying tyre, because it caused some chatter in the left corners and I nearly crashed twice; so I had to stop pushing.
“My best lap-time was with a race tyre and it was quite good – like at Aragon – but with the qualifier I am sure I could have gone faster and made the final session. I am looking to improve my feeling on the bike tomorrow because I need to be more consistent after a few laps, so we need to do some work tonight. I hope that we can improve things for Sunday and have two good races.”
Qualifying was better for two Brits as Tom Sykes took pole position for a second successive race, with fellow Brit Jonathan Rea in second place and Irishman Eugene Laverty completing the front row. Fellow Brit Chaz Davies is down in 13th place.
The first race gets underway at 11am this morning with race two then at two pm with both Fixi Crescent Suzuki riders looking for a good result.