ROAD RACING 125 (07.04.2006)
07 April 2006 - KTM-Sportmotorcycles AG

RR125 WCH: 2nd Round, 2nd Qualifying: Qatar Doha/Losail

The Second Grand Prix race of the 2006 World Championship takes place on Saturday 8th of April 2006, at the Losail Circuit on the outskirts of Qatar’s capital city, Doha. The event was moved to earlier in the season to avoid the near 40 degree temperatures experienced by the riders during last year’s event.

Under hazy conditions, and relatively mild temperatures of 31 degrees, and a track temperature of 45° C the KTM Red Bull riders found the track conditions much more predictable than in the past, with sand on the racing surface not such a problem as it has been in previous years.

Red Bull KTM rider Mika Kallio will start tomorrow’s race, from third position on the front row of the grid at the Commercialbank Grand Prix of Qatar, after the flying Finn improved on his Thursday qualifying lap time by 0,8 sec.

Kallio’s KTM teammate, Julian Simon, takes 10th position on the grid, just 0,7 sec behind the pole position. Both riders are confident for tomorrow’s race, after improving both the suspension and the overall set-up on their KTM race machines.

Mika Kallio # 36 Red Bull KTM GP 125 – 3rd position – 2’07.676
”Today’s practice was quite difficult, as we tried a different tyre that didn’t work as well as expected on my bike. After changing back I had a much better feeling. But than there was so much traffic and I never found a clear track until the very last lap. Even then, for the last two corners I was held up by Pasini, otherwise my lap time would have been even better. For tomorrow we will try to find a suspension set up to better suit my race tyre. Then I’m confident for a good race result.”

Julian Simon # 60 Red Bull KTM GP 125 – 10th position –2’08.220
”I’m not so happy with today’s position; it is not as close to the front of the grid as I would have liked. But looking at the times I’m only 0,5 sec behind Mika and the bike felt better than yesterday. My team was working well today and we found a better suspension set up. As I like the circuit and these corners, I think it will be a good race tomorrow.”

Michael Ranseder # 9 Red Bull KTM Junior Team – 32nd position – 2’11.295 “For sure I’m not happy with today’s result, even if I did improve by 0,7 sec from yesterdays qualifying. But this is not even close to being enough. With the chassis set up we are working in the right direction right now. But there are still a lot of other things we need to improve. Tomorrow it is just about keeping the throttle open and go!”

Stefan Bradl # 17 Red Bull KTM Junior Team – 33rd position – 2’11.421 “Here at Qatar it is not so easy to learn the track as there are no specific marks you can use like we normally do. It is all just desert around, everything the same colour. My goal for tomorrow is to finish my first GP in 2006, as I couldn’t ride at Jerez because of my injured hand from the Winter testing. The hand is ok now, so there should be no problem for tomorrow. I will get as much experience as possible, as this is my learning year.”

Harald Bartol — Technical and Managing Director
“The qualifying went ok. We found a setting that is working in the right direction. For the race tomorrow things do look promising.”
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