Spies On Daytona Superbike Pole - March 8th 2007

Defending AMA Superbike Champion Ben Spies put his Yoshimura Suzuki GSX-R1000 into pole position for Saturday's opening round of the 2007 series at Daytona International Speedway, Florida, just a fraction of a second ahead of team mate Mat Mladin.

Texan Spies clocked a 1:37.546 to beat Mladin's 1:37.581, although both riders were outside Mladin's 2006 lap record of 1:37.075.

Said Spies: "It felt really good. We went out and did some race set-up on race tyres early in the session and got going really good. That's the most important thing and that's when the bike is working the best. We threw on the softer tyres and tried to go for a lap. I knew from the first lap that the right side of the tyre didn't have as much grip as the race one did. I went in the first lap and ran wide through the horseshoe and had to go an extra lap. I came back around and said, 'I'm not going to do it.' And I did the same thing. That's when we put together the 37.7 lap."

New Yoshimura team rider Tommy Hayden will start from fifth on the grid after posting a time of 1:38.930.

AMA Superbike Qualifying:

1. 1. Ben Spies (Suzuki) 1:37.546
2. 2. Mat Mladin (Suzuki) 1:37.581
3. 3. Eric Bostrom (Yamaha) 1:38.195
4. 4. Roger Lee Hayden (Kawasaki) 1:38.769
5. 5. Tommy Hayden (Suzuki) 1:38.930
6. 6. Miguel Duhamel (Honda) 1:39.013
7. 7. Geoff May (Suzuki) 1:39.032
8. 8. Aaron Yates (Suzuki) 1:39.183
9. 9. Jason DiSalvo (Yamaha) 1:39.267
10. 10. Jamie Hacking (Kawasaki) 1:39.310