Home
It was a warm applause for Yukio Kagayama during the press conference as he scored the best time during the Top 10 Trial this afternoon and placed the Yoshimura Suzuki Racing Team on pole position for the Suzuka 8 Hours.
These past few years, the Yoshimura Suzuki Racing Team has often dominated the Honda held playground. However, this year the surprise came from a European team, with the great performance. The Monster Yamaha YART will start the race from second place. The Austrian team has to be grateful to their Japanese Superbike rider Katsuyuki Nakasuga for his performance, also proving the competitive value of the team and their motorcycle. ‘From now, we can’t complain anymore that the bike isn’t fast enough’, said Igor Jerman with some humour, when greeting the performance of his Japanese teammate.
The Honda Musashi RT Harc Pro takes third place with Takumi Takahashi, who brought victory for the team at the 2010 edition. The great unlucky of this Top 10 Trial is then the Honda FCC TSR. Kosuke Akiyoshi was disturbed by the crash of the Kawasaki Eva RT Trickstar during his hot lap towards the end of the session. FCC TSR will start from fourth position ahead of the Honda Suzuka Racing Team.
Two other permanent teams were selected for the Top 10. In sixth place, Yamaha Racing France GMT 94 Ipone outclassed the BMW Motorrad France 99 with Matthieu Lagrive’s performance. The Honda Crown Keibihosyou Racing and the Honda Dream RT Sakurai complete the top 10 ahead of the Kawasaki Eva RT Trickstar.
The start of the race is scheduled for tomorrow at 10:30 am local time (GMT + 9). To save energy and light in a country that is still recovering from the severe recent earthquake, the start of the race has been moved one hour earlier for a day-time arrival at 6:30 pm.
Photos FIM/GoodShoot 2011
