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MotoGP
2005 - Round 4 - Le Mans MotoGP Qualifying - Ducati Report May 14th, 2005
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MotoGP
2005 - Round 4 - Le Mans MotoGP Qualifying - Ducati Report May 14th, 2005
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| The sun finally shone at
Le Mans this afternoon, offering MotoGP riders their first
fully dry session of the weekend. Ducati Marlboro Team
riders Carlos Checa and Loris Capirossi ran strongly in the
early stages of the qualifying outing, slipping back to
ninth and tenth in the final minutes. But both men are in
confident mood after showing a consistently fast pace on
race tyres in a frantic session which ended with just 0.765
seconds covering the quickest 12. "Our grid positions here aren't the best but both Carlos and Loris have proved they are fast in race trim, which is what really matters," said Ducati MotoGP project manager Livio Suppo. "Everyone's lap times are really close and both our guys are only half a second off pole, so I think we can expect a good fight tomorrow. We don't know what to expect from the weather but I think we will be okay rain or sun, because Carlos and Loris were both good also in this morning's wet session. As always, thanks to all our technical partners, especially Bridgestone, who are making excellent progress, and Shell Advance." Carlos Checa will start tomorrow's French Grand Prix from the third row of the grid after posting ninth fastest time this afternoon. The Ducati Marlboro Team man ended up just about two tenth off first row. "I feel quite confident on the bike," said Checa. "We came here with a slightly different base chassis configuration from what we ran at the first three races because we wanted to make the bike turn into corners more quickly. The bike does seem a bit better into slow corners, though it'll be good to confirm that when we test here on Monday and Tuesday. My race pace was fine and I would have been faster on my final qualifying run if I hadn't come across another rider going slow through one of the chicanes on my second lap. We're making progress, and I'm looking forward for tomorrow." Loris Capirossi came through two days of constantly changing weather conditions to run tenth in qualifying and put himself on the fourth row of the grid. The Ducati Marlboro Team man is happy with improvements here made by his engineers to his GP5's fuel mapping. "Even if my grid position isn't the best, the bike and the tyres are working okay," he said. "On my final qualifying run I was on a really good lap but I ran wide through the last turn and then gave it too much throttle, which lost me time. That's the kind of thing that can happen when you're going for one very fast lap. Before that I did a ten-lap endurance run, maintaining a very good rhythm. I'm really happy with how the bike's behaving, both in the wet and the dry. For sure, a fourth-row start won't help, so what I really need is a good start, because if I can get away with the leading pack, I think I can maintain a good pace."
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MotoGP Championship
2005
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