Lavilla pole at Oulton

Gregorio Lavilla claimed his and Dunlop’s first pole position of the year for tomorrow’s fourth round of the Bennetts’ British Superbike championship at Oulton Park.

The Airwaves Ducati rider just ducked in side Ryuichi Kiyonari’s lap record of 1:35.436 set last July with a best time of 1:35.430.

Lavilla currently leads the championship and said: “Being on pole is good but the races tomorrow are long and there’s always the weather and, looking at the forecast, it sounds like it could be a gamble for all of us.”

British Champion Ryuichi Kiyonari suffered a minor crash in Sunday morning free practice but claimed second on the grid with a 1:35.59 from Lavilla’s team-mate
Leon Haslam who clocked a best lap of 1:35.92.

Tom Sykes completed the front row with a 1:35.99 – his first time on the front row since coming to BSB this year with the Stobart Honda team.

Jonathan Rea qualified fifth on the HM Plant Honda ahead of Stobart’s Shane Byrne, Cal Crutchlow on the Rizla Suzuki and Leon Camier who also crashed his Bike Animal Honda in the morning’s free practice.

Karl Harris was ninth on the Hydrex Honda, complaining of front-end chatter. Dean Thomas was tenth on the Samsung Suzuki from Michael Rutter’s MSS Kawasaki and Virgin Yamaha’s Tommy Hill.

After such promising results at Silverstone and being so close to the Hondas and Ducatis, Chris Walker was only 13th in qualifying on the Rizla Suzuki, 1.57s off the pace of pole-sitter Lavilla and complaining that even on race tyres his bikes was still not fully competitive.

The superbikes took to the track just after a shower dampened the track during the National Superstock qualifying but the track was drying fast and the BSB session was declared dry so the restricted tyre allocation of three rear tyres remained in place.