Tom Sykes was looking set for yet another Superpole win as he approached Superpole 3 but a fall deprived him of the chance and he now starts Sunday’s races from the third row of the grid.

Sykes was running a high lean angle as he negotiated the long turn three when he lost the front end and he was unable to make it back to the pits. In the era of single bike rules he had no spare machine to use to get back into contention for the font row, and what could have been his seventh pole in succession. He ended up ninth on the grid.

Tom still leads the overall Superpole count in 2013 by some margin, with six pole positions to his credit.

His misfortune in Superpole today did not disguise Sykes’ sheer pace through qualifying and practice and Sykes is now confident that with two good starts he should be in contention for the top race places as he has been all season long on his Ninja ZX-10R.

Second KRT rider Loris Baz pushed his way to Superpole 2 but was unable to improve his time enough to make it into the final Superpole session and he earned a 12th starting place overall. He is on the fourth row of the grid for Sunday’s two 25-lap races.

Federico Sandi (Kawasaki Team Pedercini) ended regulation qualifying in 16th place, while Lorenzo Savadori (Kawasaki Team Pedercini) will start the races from 18th place in Moscow.

Tom Sykes:

“I just lost the front at the very last moment in turn three. It is a shame but sometimes these things happen. It is a small mistake and it means that we will start on row three, so it is a mistake with not a very big consequence. In this respect it is not so bad and tomorrow, in the races, is where you make up points. I am still confident with the settings of the Ninja ZX-10R for this track. I just need to make a clean start each time and continue in a good way. Pace in general has been strong and the lap times are good, which we saw in Superpole 1 when I was using a race tyre. It will be 25 laps each time so there will be long races here. In Imola I dropped to fourth at the very beginning and then had time to react so hopefully we have lots of time tomorrow to make the correction for today’s small mistake.”

Loris Baz:

“I used a qualifying tyre to start in Superpole 2 but I had a lot of chatter so I almost lost the front and had to save it on my elbow. I lost time and was not going to make it to the third part of Superpole so I came in and we fitted a race tyre. I did my two best times of the weekend after that, but I could not go fast enough to make it into Superpole 3. Race pace is not so bad but we have a small issue with set-up on corner entry. I am sure we can sort it in morning warm-up. If we do find an improvement I will have to make a good start to be able to get to the front and fight for a top five place again.”

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