WEST HAPPY IN SUMMER SUN AT THE SACHSENRING
29 July 2005 - KTM-Sportmotorcycles AG

Australian rider Anthony West was at home in the hot and sunny conditions when he qualified eleventh fastest on the provisional grid for Sunday’s 250 Motorcycle German Grand Prix.

With tracking temperatures touching 50 degrees West said the weather reminded him of his Gold Coast home in Australia during summer.

This race is just the second grand prix for the new Red Bull KTM 250 developed and built in Austria by Harald Bartol. Although still in a test and development phase the bike ran reliably and with solid performance in today’s practice and qualifying.

West finished the day just 1.5s off the provisional pole time set by Alex de Angelis (Aprilia), a closer gap in the dry than at last weekend’s debut race in England.

At Donington last Sunday, West was in superb form in a rain-lashed British GP when he finished a close second behind Randy de Puniet in a thrilling race.

Conditions during today’s practice and qualifying where dramatically different although there is a forecast of cooler conditions, perhaps with some rain, for Sunday.

In the morning free practice session West and KTM technicians found the fast bumps one some sections of the track a problem, but set-up changes for the afternoon qualifying improved bike balance.

Final qualifying for grid positions will be held tomorrow afternoon.

Anthony West #14 - Eleventh - 1’26.829

“In the morning session I had some set-up problems, especially over the big bumps on the fast part of the track. It felt like riding a KTM motocross bike over a set of ‘whoops’, not road racing. After changing the set-up for qualifying the bike was much better, it wasn’t bouncing around so much and I had much better rear grip. I also had better front end feel, which is critical at his track. I set my fastest time on a standard race tyre so I’m happy about that. Earlier I tried a dual-compound Dunlop rear tyre that I had not used before and I didn’t get the best out of it; we probably should have saved that tyre for a fast run at the end.”

Harald Bartol - Technical and Managing Director

“We still are still in a development phase and sorting out the bike, but already we are more competitive in the dry than last week at Donington. For this race we have prepared two identical, 90-degree firing order motors for Anthony. The broken conrod in one motor at the British GP last week was caused by a main bearing problem but that has been modified and fixed for this race. Both KTM 250s ran reliably today.”

www.ktm.at

More News
  For July 2005
  From KTM-Sportmotorcycles AG
  For 250
  Biker247.com Home Page