Guintoli The Day One Leader As Aprilias Run Amok

The three Aprilia riders in the 2014 WSB entry list dominated the opening day of practice at Sepang in the first ever visit of the WSB paddock to the regular GP circuit in Malaysia.

Sylvain Guintoli (Aprilia Racing) held off his team-mate Marco Melandri after the opening two sessions, putting in a 2’05.096 lap in the afternoon to go fastest of all.
Toni Elias (Red Devils Roma Aprilia) completed a very good first day for Aprilia with the third best time, only 0.126 seconds from the leader.

Ducati’s Davide Giugliano just pipped Tom Sykes (Kawasaki Racing Team) to fourth place, by five thousandths of a second, in a very close contest, with the top five riders covered by only 0.187 seconds.

Eugene Laverty (Voltcom Crescent Suzuki) made great improvements to place sixth with official Ducati Superbike Team rider Chaz Davies seventh, and only 0.352 seconds from the provisional pole of Guintoli.

A faller in the morning session, Jonathan Rea (Pata Honda) recovered to go eighth, but he was 0.656 seconds from the leader Guintoli at the end of play.

Loris Baz (KRT) and Alex Lowes (Voltcom Crescent Suzuki) rounded out the top ten, with Lowes just under a second from the best time.

Two British Leons, Haslam and Camier, went 11th and 12th respectively, making Camier the best qualified Evo rider. He is one place ahead of the Evo championship leader, David Salom. Christian Iddon (Alstare Bimota) went 15th on his Evo spec bike.