Marino Returns to Assen in Style with STK1000 Pole
. By Bikeland Staff
Pata Yamaha Official STK 1000 Team's Florian Marino returned to Assen in style today to claim his first pole position of the 2017 FIM Superstock European Championship. His teammate Roberto Tamburini made it two Yamaha YZF-R1Ms on the front row as he also impressed to start Sunday's race from third on the grid.
Qualifying at the TT Circuit Assen last season saw Marino crash heavily, breaking his right leg. Despite this, he has shown no fear on his return and wasted no time getting down to business in Qualifying. He immediately jumped to the top of the timesheets with a 1'37.144s lap on his first flying run. The French rider continued to set the pace during the session and was still occupying first position with a 1'37.103s when a Red Flag came out with six laps to go. The best was still yet to come, when the session re-commenced Marino smashed the previous pole record at Assen with a stunning 1'36.775s to secure first place on the grid for Sunday's race. He was the only rider to break to the 1'37 barrier during the session.
Tamburini was not to be outdone and immediately settled into a rhythm on his Yamaha YZF-R1M, almost matching his teammate's pace. When the session was red flagged the Italian was fourth fastest, with a 1'37.456s lap. Once Qualifying resumed he immediately improved his time to a 1.37.126s to secure third on the grid and join his teammate on the front row. Tamburini was just 0.351s off the pole time of Marino and with good race pace both riders are feeling confident of fighting for the win on Sunday.
Untitled Florian Marino 1st - 1'36.775
Pata Yamaha Official STK1000 Team
Today the team gave me what I asked for yesterday, we made a good step on the bike that allowed me to ride more like I want. The lap times show that I was able to ride faster and enjoy the bike more. Thanks to the team for their work. For me it was a good revenge after the accident last year. If you said to me last year I would not have believed I would have been able to come back here and start the race on pole. Its great and I enjoyed the lap time, although we still have some work to do for the race tomorrow.
Untitled Roberto Tamburini 3rd - 1'37.126
Pata Yamaha Official STK1000 Team
Today's qualifying practice wasnt so bad, we still need to improve some parts of the bike tomorrow morning in warm up, but overall I'm happy. I feel confident with my R1, it was very important to start on the first row tomorrow, and I think tomorrow morning in Warm Up we must improve some parts of the set up to be more competitive. At the moment we are quite strong to fight at the front. It will be a tough race because some of the riders are very strong but we are confident and I think it will be a good race. One of the areas we are looking to improve is the stability under braking to allow us to be faster through the corner.