Weather: sunny 23° C
Track: dry, 37° C

Winston Ten Kate rider Karl Muggeridge qualified 18th in the first qualifying session at round one of the World Superbike Championship here in Qatar.

It didn’t quite go to plan for Muggas and the Winston Ten Kate team on this first day of the 2005 Superbike Championship. In the morning free practice it was raining here in Qatar for the first time after four years apparently. As there are only three wet tyres per rider available throughout the weekend, the decision was made to save them for more important sessions.

In the afternoon’s qualifying Muggas who’s still suffering from the severe flu tried hard to get the CBR 1000 working around the corners, but they just couldn’t quite find the right settings which gave him enough grip to complete a fast lap. There’s only to hope that tomorrow’s morning qualifying will be dry so he’ll get a second chance to make it into Superpole.

Muggas comments: “I’m very disappointed with this afternoon’s result. I know we could have done much better und should be at least in the top 15. It seams that everything was a bit a problem this afternoon, for one thing I seem not to be able to get rid of this flu, it just closes my whole head and it’s difficult to concentrate for the whole lap. Then we were also having some problems with the breaks and the front grip. It just felt like I was on a complete different bike as at the test. We will have to sit down tonight and go through everything again to make sure we are ready for tomorrow.”