AMA - Hodgson and Bostrom On Provisional Second Row In Ohio - July 22nd 2005

In a day marked by damp conditions, Parts Unlimited Ducati Austin teammates Eric Bostrom and Neil Hodgson qualified their Ducati 999s on the provisional second row for this weekend's Mid-Ohio Superbike races.

Bostrom, second in the morning session and just 0.06 seconds behind the leader, had a bike issue in the afternoon that kept him from repeating his recent excellent performances. Eric, winner of two of the last four AMA Superbike races, is confident he can improve in tomorrow's qualifying session. Bostrom's lap time was 1:27.457. "We had a good test here. In the morning, that was shining through with the good lap times," said Eric. "In the afternoon, I had two bikes with very different setups. I liked the one we had a problem with better and was down into the 1:27s pretty quickly on that machine. With the other bike, it took a while to get my lap times down and I definitely prefer the first set-up. Tomorrow, we'll have both bikes with those settings. Still, things are going pretty well. We need to get some track time tomorrow and I look forward to putting my head down in the race."

Hodgson, the former World Superbike Champion, learned the difficult Mid-Ohio circuit on Friday. Neil was a solid seventh in his first day of competition at Mid-Ohio. He finished just 0.3 seconds behind his teammate. "To be honest, I'd have to criticize myself more than the bike at the moment. I'm still trying to get the rhythm of this place," said Neil. "I'm trying a little too hard at the moment, trying to get through the corners. With all the bumps, you almost have to relax a bit to get through them here."

"It was a productive day," said Team Manager Tom Bodenbach. "Eric ran well in the morning and things are looking up for him in the races. He liked the first bike's settings. Neil got a lot of valuable laps around this place and that's what you need to do well here."

Tomorrow's Superbike race begins at 3 PM local time.

Friday Qualifying times:

1. 1. Mat Mladin, Suzuki - 1:26.670
2. 2. Jake Zemke, Honda - 1:26.717
3. 3. Miguel Duhamel, Honda - 1:26.789
4. 4. Ben Spies, Suzuki - 1:27.020
5. 5. Aaron Yates, Suzuki - 1:27.123
6. 6. ERIC BOSTROM, Ducati - 1:27.457
7. 7 NEIL HODGSON, Ducati - 1:27.759