Leon Camier will start Sunday’s eni FIM Superbike World Championship race from Imola from the second row of the grid.
The Ashford rider managed to put his FIXI Crescent Suzuki machine on sixth place after making it through to Superpole three.
His teammate Jules Cluzel wasn’t so fortunate and will start and didn’t make it through to the final two parts of Superpole and will start the race from 14th on the grid.
After Loris Baz crashed out early on in the final Superpole session, Camier set about trying to improve his lap time with a worn qualifying tyre but couldn’t improve his time.
However, starting in sixth places for the two races will give the Kent favourite a great chance to score some great points and challenge for the podium places when the lights go out.
Speaking after qualifying a pleased Camier, said: “I’m pretty happy with qualifying to be honest, but I still feel that I could have got a better lap-time out of the bike, because the qualifiers I used in Superpole 2 and 3 were both very different laps and if had strung the two together it would have been a step quicker.”
“My last lap certainly could have been better, but it is good to be somewhere near the front and to have a semi-decent place to start from tomorrow. I think we’ve done a good job on race tyres and so we’re quite happy with how the weekend has gone so far and now we just need to see how the races go tomorrow.”
Team Manager Paul Denning was delighted to see that Leon and his team’s hard work over the weekend was rewarded in qualifying.
He said: “Leon and his crew have been working hard all weekend to improve the pace of the GSX-R and today’s qualifying result – putting the bike on the second row – is very positive and we have high hopes for a decent showing during the races.
“The engine performance – greatly assisted by Yoshimura – has improved a lot this season and at some circuits, Imola being one of them, we now have an opposite problem to the one in 2012, in that getting the power down smoothly without it spinning or wheelying is the biggest challenge and we are working hard to achieve the best solution. Leon’s always a consistent and strong racer, so let’s hope he can get a good start and challenge with the fastest guys tomorrow.
“Jules is at the opposite end of the spectrum in terms of the qualifying result today. It really didn’t work out for him and he has been struggling to find a rhythm all weekend. Free Practice was probably our best session with him, so we will go back to something as close as we can to that setting and hope that Jules can do what he has all season long and that is to positively surprise us in the races and show what a fighter he is!”