Tumble for Thomas ahead of qualifying.
Dean Thomas had a difficult day on track at Cadwell Park when he crashed his Samsung Suzuki during final free practice. Due to the crash he had to run his number two bike in qualifying and ended that session in sixteenth position.
“It just all went wrong!†he joked, “We have been struggling all weekend. Nothing too drastic just getting too much feedback out of the forks and losing a bit of rear grip. Each time we made an alteration to make the bike steer a little better we lose more grip, we change it back we get the grip back but then the bike won’t steer. We seem to be stuck in a rut really.â€
The team made some changes which seemed to improve the situation however it didn’t work out well on track. “We made some changes and went a bit quicker. On the lap I went down I was half a second up on that split alone. I pushed a bit hard I think and just turned into turn two, got to the middle of the turn the front chattered twice and then folded the front tyre,†explained Thomas.
The crash caused a reasonable amount of damage which left the team stripping the good bits off the number one bike and putting them on the number two machine. Due to running the number two bike the bulk of qualifying was spent ironing out little problems as Thomas went on to say, “We spent most of that session trying to get all the teething problems out of the way and make sure the bike is to the spec we need and go for it. We are sixteenth on the grid which is back in the same bracket where we end up every time. A little bit more off the pace this weekend than normal, I think we have had a bit of a rough trot. I think tomorrow we will have a few tweaks to the bike and sort a few things out and we will be back to our usual position.â€
He is hoping that once the racing gets under way he can break into the top ten where he feels he and his Samsung team should be.
