Portuguese GP: Gresini Racing qualifying report

PIERLUIGI COLLINA ENJOYS TEAM SAN CARLO HONDA GRESINI EFFORTS FROM PIT-LANE Team San Carlo Honda Gresini riders Shinya Nakano and Alex De Angelis qualified in eleventh and sixteenth place respectively for the Grand prix of Portugal under the ...

PIERLUIGI COLLINA ENJOYS TEAM SAN CARLO HONDA GRESINI EFFORTS FROM PIT-LANE

Team San Carlo Honda Gresini riders Shinya Nakano and Alex De Angelis qualified in eleventh and sixteenth place respectively for the Grand prix of Portugal under the unmistakable gaze of one of sport's most recognizable faces.

Alex paid the price for a lack of time spent on track this weekend, having been unable to clock up many laps and gather vital set-up data yesterday when he was still recovering from a fever. Shinya also had some set-up issues today but his overall feeling with the bike continues to improve.

The Team San Carlo Honda Gresini hospitality unit today welcomed Castrol, who unveiled CASTROL INDEX to the media. It is a data analysis system that monitors the performances of football players during a match. Pierluigi Collina, who has helped develop the system alongside Castrol, was also at the presentation and he was then able to enjoy some two-wheeled action from the team's pit box. Interested parties can check out the new system online at www.castrolindex.com.

Alex De Angelis (16th 1.38.823): "Considering my physical condition over the last couple of days it was important for me today to spend the whole day out on the bike -- in both free practice and qualifying. I feel better now although the session did leave me feeling a bit low because I've never qualified so far back -- not in MotoGP or in any other class. We still have work to do but we know that this is a difficult moment for us made worse by my illness. We were left a little behind in terms of finding the right set-up for qualifying today and the race tomorrow. This evening we will look at the telemetry to try and understand where we can improve our pace."

Shinya Nakano (11th 1.37.664): "It was a difficult session because yesterday we were in top form but today things have changed and it was difficult to improve my pace because the bike was unstable. I had some difficulties under braking and acceleration, with a few problems emerging on the front and rear. We have worked on improving the setting but we were still a long way from finding the right balance. With starting from the fourth row tomorrow it will be important to get away well because it is difficult to overtake here. The objective for tomorrow's race is to improve on the ninth place finish at Jerez".

Andrea Soldo (European Marketing Manager for Castrol Motorcycle): "I was really happy to welcome Pierluigi Collina here to Estoril. MotoGP is a series that has heavily featured data analysis for many years so it is interesting to compare the system that Collina has helped to develop with the telemetric system of a motorcycle racing team. In fact, during the meeting between Collina and Jimenez (Shinya Nakano's Chief Engineer), some very similar parallels emerged between the two sports and parallelism is close to a phrase we truly believe in: THE MORE YOU KNOW THE BETTER YOU PERFORM".