Press Release | May 22, 2010
The following is from Kenny Noyes’ publicist…In only his third Grand Prix start and on a track he had never races, Moto2 rookie Kenny Noyes took the pole in the tightest grid in the 61 years of Grand Prix history. Only 0.969 of a second separated the top 27 riders at the 2.6 mile Le Mans circuit.Riding his Jack & Jones by Antonio Banderas Promoharris, Kenny was 28th in the first free practice on Friday with a best lap of 1’41.319, improving to 1´40.319 in the Saturday morning free session, but in the qualifying session he went to the top of the timing screen with a 1´39.239 with 8 minutes remaining.Kenny pitted and fitted a fresh tire, but when he came back for a final run he was slightly balked by heavy traffic and was unable to improve. When he came back to the pits he didn’t know he had the pole until he was directed to the number 1 position in the enclosure area.
According to Dorna´s official statistician, Noyes is the first American rider to take pole position in the intermediate class (Moto2 has replaced 250cc) since John Kocinski at the Australian Grand Prix of 1990.Kenny NoyesPole: 1’39.234
“We were worried coming here to a new track. We were fast in the preseason but that was on Spanish tracks that I know from racing Spanish 1000cc Formula Extreme for the last few years. I have never raced here before and it was hard to get on the pace, but the team worked hard and gave me a great bike. We dropped a 2.3 seconds in two days and found some settings that help me get the bike turned easier. In Jerez where we led a few laps and ran at the front the bike was very stable but not agile enough. I think we have a good set up for tomorrow.”With the changes we made for the qualifying session I was able to ride more aggressively and hit my marks on the brakes and on the apexes. It certainly helped that I was able to follow Takahashi. I learned so much following him. In this class if you make a slight mistake you can lose ten places, but today we got it right!”
