Image: Keith Muir.

Crankt Protein Honda Racing duo Troy Herfoss and Bryan Staring are pleased with the new CBR1000RR SP2, which the pair are debuting this weekend at Hidden Valley’s fourth round of the Yamaha Motor Finance Australian Superbike Championship (ASBK) presented by Motul Pirelli.

Herfoss piloted the top-spec Fireblade to fourth in today’s qualifying with a time of 1m06.398, just 0.343s off pole sitter Daniel Falzon (JD Racing Yamaha) – a solid improvement over Friday’s practice.

After three days on the circuit, the defending ASBK champion spoke of his confidence in the bike, and after cutting down his times, he believes he’ll be competitive throughout Sunday’s races.

“So far the feeling is really good,” Herfoss told CycleOnline.com.au. “There’s a lot of pressure taking a new bike to a race meeting, it’s essentially a test for us really. In some ways it’s holding us back in that we don’t want to make big changes because we can’t afford to go backwards.

“We’ve been tweaking in small areas, and we’ve made slow progression over the three days we’ve been here. Going into Sunday, we’ve closed the gap from almost a second off, to now two or three tenths – we’re in the race now. There’s a few more changes to try for tomorrow’s warm-up, but the general feeling of the team is good and we’re so happy.”

Western Australian Staring, who lodged the fifth fastest time behind his teammate, praised the new electronics system, stating he’s never used a package that is so advanced.

“The electronics are really good,” said an enthusiastic Staring. “It’s an unbelievable system for me, I’ve never had anything control or tame the bike so much – and I’ve ridden with quite a few different systems over the last half-dozen years. This system is so user friendly, the bike’s really stable and does a lot of good things.

“It corrects itself without rider input sometimes, it feels like a really advanced system, and as my trust grows in it, I think you’ll see that result on the race track.”

Bikes are set to hit the track tomorrow at 9am, with the premier Superbike category scheduled to take on two 17-lap races at the Darwin circuit.