Valencia WSB: Hopkins one second off in first qualifying

John Hopkins declared himself happy with his lap but disappointed with his position at the end of the opening his first ever day in WSB at Valencia.

The former MotoGP man ended the first timed session in 18th position, with his fastest lap of 1m 35.868s just 1.093s slower than pole setter Max Biaggi.

Speaking to MCN he said: “The position is not where I want to be down in 18th. I’m not pleased with that but I am pleased with the fact that we are a second away from the front and I know that the set up I’ve got right now is still miles away.”

Hopkins completed a total of 39 laps during the day in which he only made minimal changes to the bike and set-up he inherited from the man he replaced at Stiggy Honda – Roberto Rolfo. 

He said: “We ran in to a few technical problems this afternoon so we didn’t get to do as many laps as I wanted and no long run. We’ve still got a lot of work to do and today has been a case of going out there and doing what we could and this evening we’ll look at all the data and implement some changes fro tomorrow.”

“I’ve got a good feeling with the tyres now and when they go off it gets crazy. The lap times drop by about a second but the thing slides around from side to side it’s a lot of fun. That’s pretty different to what we had in MotoGP and I like it.”