Image: Russell Colvin.

Yamaha Racing Team’s Wayne Maxwell will lead the YMI Superbikes into Superpole qualifying this afternoon for round one of the 2016 YMF Australian Superbike Championship presented by Motul Pirelli.

With temperatures increasing this afternoon, few riders went quicker in qualifying two, meaning Maxwell, Troy Herfoss (Crankt Protein Honda Racing), Glenn Allerton (Yamaha Racing Team), Anthony West (Crankt Protein Honda Racing) remain the top four.

An improved time from Mike Jones (DesmoSport Ducati) saw him jump to position five ahead of Cru Halliday (Yamaha Racing Team). Daniel Falzon (JD Racing Yamaha) also improved his time to move into position seven.

A notable faller in the session was Brayden Elliott (Suzuki), but he still qualified eighth, from Ben Burke (SA Kawasaki BCperformance) and New Zealand champion Sloan Frost (Next Gen Suzuki), who was another rider to improve this afternoon.

The second session was led by Herfoss with a 57.678s, still extremely quick in the conditions, over Jones, Allerton, Falzon and Maxwell. Both Allerton and Maxwell completed minimal laps in the session.

Image: Russell Colvin.

It was championship leader Troy Guenther (Yamaha) who was fastest in the second Supersport session, however Sam Clarke’s (Kawasaki) time from this morning secured him the first spot on the grid.

Clarke set a 1m00.479s earlier on today, which was fastest than the speed of Guenther’s 1m00.607s in the afternoon proceedings. Cambridge Olivier (Yamaha), Luke Mitchell (Yamaha) and Ben Blyth (Yamaha) filled the top five. Callum Spriggs (Kawasaki) will start sixth.

The maiden Yamaha R3 Cup specification category pole belonged to Hunter Ford, his laptime from the opening session in earlier conditions this morning enough to lead Zac Levy and Callum Alderson. Aidan Hayes and Ty Lynch completed the top five.

Yamaha YZF-R3-mounted multiple Australian champion Brandon Demmery scored pole position in the Production ranks, while in Moto3/125GP it was Brian Houghton (Honda) who claimed the top spot.