PROGRESS FOR VAN DER MARK AT DONINGTON PARK
Pata Honda rider Michael van der Mark declared himself happy with progress made during day one of the sixth-round meeting of the 2015 World Superbike championship at Donington Park in the UK today. With three free practices sessions held today, Van der Mark had a chance to evaluate chassis changes made to his Pata Honda CBR1000RR Fireblade SP machine. The Dutchmen set the eighth-fastest combined time today, just 0.5s behind the provisional pole position time set by local British rider Tom Sykes.
Michael van der Mark (P8 1m28.748s): “I’m really happy with the last session this afternoon. To be honest, in the first two sessions today we were really struggling but we were able to improve each time we went out. For the final session today we made a big change to the CBR and I got a good feeling again. I was able to do some consistent lap times with the old tyre and then, at the end, we put in a new tyre to go directly to Superpole 2. Even though there are still many things we can improve, I am really happy with our first day’s work here.”