Wild Card’s James Ellison and Leon Camier will line up on the fourth and fifth rows of the grid for tomorrow’s two World Superbike races at Donington Park.

After provisionally qualifying 6th and 12th yesterday, both riders were in confident mood this morning. 20 minutes into second Qualifying Practice, Leon tipped off going into Craner Curves. Although uninjured, he sat-out the remainder of the session. Leon’s fastest time of 1:31.454 set yesterday was good enough to see him progress to Superpole. James gradually reduced his lap times throughout the morning. He secured 15th fastest and a place in Superpole with a time of 1:31.476 on his final lap.

As the Airwaves Yamaha team was unable to repair his race bike, Leon made use of final Free Practice to familiarise himself with the spare YZF-R1. He battled hard throughout the first Superpole session, but was to drop out of the top 16 in the dying moments. Leon’s fastest time of 1:31.176 places him 17th on the grid for tomorrow’s two races. James meanwhile managed to better his previous fastest time by over half a second to progress to Superpole 2.

During the second Superpole session, whilst still adapting to the Pirelli qualifying tyres, James produced a best lap of 1:30.816 to go 14th fastest.

After qualifying James commented, “I’m really frustrated to be honest. The Airwaves Yamaha felt good. It was going exactly where I wanted it. The package was absolutely right. The Pirelli qualifying tyres helped to settle the bike but I needed more time on them. I needed to build up to speed and get a better feel for them. But the times are really close so we have to be pleased and feel confident of some good results tomorrow.”

Although not qualifying as high as he’d hoped, Leon is still looking forward to the races saying, “Going into this weekend we hoped to qualify higher than 17th. Our times had been looking really promising so I am disappointed. My race bike was destroyed in the crash this morning and I put myself at a disadvantage having to use the spare bike. The times across the whole field were really close. In Superpole 1, the top 20 were separated by less than a second and considering I was on the spare bike, I was happy with the times we produced. All is definitely not lost. The plan for the races will be to try and buck my trend of appalling starts and then push until the chequered flag. I’ve had a few races in the British Superbike Championship recently where I’ve had to fight my way through the field. I’ll be doing all I can to put on a similar show for the British fans tomorrow.”

Team Manager Colin Wright said of qualifying, “The Airwaves Yamaha team are disappointed to finish where we are on the grid. But we are optimistic that both James and Leon will improve throughout the races tomorrow. Following Leon’s crash in Qualifying Practice, he had to use the spare bike for Superpole. This bike is the one which he used for the opening two rounds of the British Superbike Championship, and although good enough to help score points in the domestic series, isn’t up to the level to compete at the top of the World Superbike Championship. We will attempt to rebuild Leon’s race bike in time for warm-up tomorrow.”

Race One at Donington Park is scheduled to start at 1200hrs tomorrow. Race Two is scheduled to start at 1530hrs.