RACE 1 PODIUM FOR LACONI BRINGS LITTLE JOY FOR DUCATI XEROX TEAM AT
BRANDS HATCH – DNF AND SEVENTH FOR TOSELAND

Brands Hatch (UK), Sunday 7 August 2005: The Ducati Xerox Team came away from
the eighth round of the World Superbike championship at Brands Hatch in front of
a 108,000 crowd with just one podium for Régis Laconi as the two wins went to
points leader Troy Corser (Suzuki) and Noriyuki Haga (Yamaha). Laconi finished
fifth in the second race, while team-mate James Toseland scored a DNF after
stopping with an electrical problem on lap 10 and a seventh place in race 2
after running third until just before half-distance, saying goodbye to any
chance of repeating his 2004 title win.

“I’m a bit devastated really” declared Toseland. “We qualified well, had the
problem with the bike in first race and then on the warm-up lap the bike had a
few vibrations so we changed it on the grid just to be sure. For the first three
laps I thought I was pretty comfortable but then I couldn’t get the grip down
and Troy and Nori just edged away. I was hoping for a mistake because I wasn’t
stronger than them in any place. I chose the 200 mm tyre, which no one else had
gone for, and in hindsight I should’ve chosen the 190 like the other guys but I
felt pretty good with it even though we didn’t get the chance to do a full race
distance. When the rear tyre starts to go down you’ve got no traction at the
rear entering the corners, that makes the front push even more and you’ve got to
brake earlier. If you do that you get overtaken and that’s what happened in
race 2. A DNF and a seventh, same results as last year, Brands is frustrating.
All these people wanted was to see was a Brit on the podium and they didn’t get
that today.”

“I needed more grip to try and follow these guys from the beginning to the
finish of race 1 but they were too fast and so I settled for third” declared
Laconi. “We changed a few things on the bike for the second race but it didn’t
make much improvement and so I just tried to do my best. I didn’t make a good
start again and it was difficult to pass, everyone was just fighting like it was
the last lap! I tried to pass James for third but put the wrong gear in and
there was no engine braking and I went wide. After I tried one more time to gain
some places but there was not much I could do. All weekend we used a different
190 tyre to everyone, the hardest one, and it was a surprise that we were unable
to push harder. We had to try something to improve in race 2 but it just wasn’t
enough.”

RACE 1:

 1. Corser (Suzuki)
 2. Haga (Yamaha)
 3. Laconi (Ducati Xerox)
 4. Vermeulen (Honda)
 5. Walker (Kawasaki)
 6. Muggeridge (Honda)
 7. Pitt (Yamaha)
 8. Lanzi (Ducati SC)

RACE 2:

 1. Haga
 2. Corser
 3. Vermeulen
 4. Walker
 5. Laconi
 6. Pitt
 7. Toseland (Ducati Xerox)
 8. Lanzi

POINTS :

Riders
 1. Corser     344
 2. Vermeulen  234
 3. Laconi     214
 4. Kagayama   172
 5. Haga       167
 6. Toseland   161

Manufacturers
 1. Suzuki    353
 2. Ducati    257
 3. Honda     250
 4. Yamaha    208
 5. Kawasaki  143
 6. Petronas   18