Henny Ray Abrams | June 19, 2009
Yamaha’s Ben Spies was knocked from the top spot in Friday qualifying when Ducati Xerox’s Michel Fabrizio threw down two quick laps at the end of the first session for Sunday’s eighth round of the World Superbike Championship at the Misano World Circuit near the Italian Adriatic.
Spies dominated on his first visit to the facility, holding the top spot for 35 minutes before Fabrizio produced two hot laps, one faster than the other. The Italian ended the one hour session with a best of 1:37.016. Spies’ best was off by .086 in a typically tight WSB session: The top 19 riders were covered by the same second.Alstare Suzuki Brux’s still-injured Yukio Kagayama was a tenth from Spies in third with only .029 secs. on Hannspree Ten Kate Honda’s Jonathan Rea.Broc Parkes made it five brands in the top five by qualifying the Kawasaki ZX10RR fifth fastest. Teammate Jamie Hacking finished his first day at Misano 20th fastest.Behind Parkes came Ten Kate Honda’s Ryuichi Kiyonari and Carlos Checa, separated by .045 secs. with championship leader Nori Haga (Ducati Xerox) eighth.Next came Stiggy Racing Honda’s Leon Haslam in ninth. Teammate John Hopkins returned from an injury-forced layoff to finish the day 26th fastest.Qualifying:
1. Michel Fabrizio (Ducati) 1:37.016
2. Ben Spies (Yamaha) 1:37.102
3. Yukio Kagayama (Suzuki) 1:37.209
4. Jonathan Rea (Honda) 1:37.238
5. Broc Parkes (Kawasaki) 1:37.281
6. Ryuichi Kiyonari (Honda) 1:37.396
7. Carlos Checa (Honda) 1:37.441
8. Nori Haga (Ducati) 1:37.451
9. Leon Haslam (Honda) 1:37.490
10. Troy Corser (BMW) 1:37.503
Other:
20. Jamie Hacking (Kawasaki) 1:38.441
26. John Hopkins (Honda) 1:38.856
Henny Ray Abrams | Contributing Editor
Abrams is the longest-serving contributor at Cycle News. Over the course of his 35-some years of writing and shooting photos, he’s covered events from MotoGP to the Motocross World Championship - and everything in between.
