Can Öncü will start on pole position for the first race of the weekend in the second round of the FIM Supersport World Championship at the Autódromo Internacional do Algarve, narrowly missing out on topping his existing outright circuit record.
Öncü, who finished runner-up in the series last year and moves to replace WorldSSP champion Stefano Manzi in the Pata Yamaha Ten Kate Racing squad, started the day strong with second in the morning’s Free Practice as the sun shone down in Portimão.
But it was in Superpole where the Turkish ace made real progress with the Yamaha R9, improving his lap-time to 1’42.670, just missing out on his existing circuit record of 1’42.643. A red flag with five minutes to go led to a long delay, but as the session resumed nobody was able to get close to Öncü who sat atop of the field by 0.6 seconds as the chequered flag came out.
GMT94 Yamaha’s Lucas Mahias joins Öncü on the front row in third, with championship leader Albert Arenas continuing his strong start as he joins the WorldSSP field this year to lead the second row. Roberto Garcia (GMT-94) shrugged off a Friday morning crash to secure eighth on the grid.
Yuki Okamoto (Pata Yamaha Ten Kate) lines up 24th and Aldi Satya Mahendra, riding injured after a cycling accident in Indonesia, will start 25th.
Race 1 gets underway at 14:00 GMT.
Can Öncü (Pata Yamaha Ten Kate Racing) – 1st, 1’42.643
“I am very happy, to be honest, because the first race for me in Australia was difficult – this year I am with a new team and things do take a bit of time for you to get used to everything when things are different. But after the first race, we were already in a good position as a team and I started to understand more what they want from me – after all, they beat me last year so I have to listen to them, I have listened, adapted my style and now I feel very good on the bike so I am excited for tomorrow’s first race. Supersport is very competitive at the minute, so I think it will be a tough fight but I am confident we can push for the top positions.”
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