A POSITIVE START FOR VAN DER MARK IN SPAIN
Michael van der Mark set the overall seventh fastest time in the two practice sessions today at Aragon, Spain for the third round of the World Superbike Championship. The Dutch SBK rookie is confident in the changes made today and feels that him and the team can make further improvements in tomorrow’s practice session ahead of the afternoon Superpole, where final grid places for Sunday’s race will be set.
Michael van der Mark (P7, 1m52.558s): “I’m quite positive for today, in the first session I felt happy but for the second session we made some good changes and I improved my lap time. We have much to improve on but for today I’m happy. Tomorrow I think we will try a few more different options and hopefully again improve the lap times, and we will have a long run for a race simulation.”
Pieter Breddels (technical coordinator): “In the end Michael van der Mark finished seventh and Sylvain Guintoli was ninth, so they’re really close with about two tenths between them. We’re looking at the problems from today, which aren’t huge things but it’s not just in one area. It’s mainly with both bike set-ups and we’re working through things. We are a little bit behind where we want to be but after trying different solutions today we have a clearer picture building of tomorrow and where to go. It’s all working progress and we have to keep pushing to try and close the gap.”