DONINGTON, England, 12 July 2003 — World champion Valentino Rossi set a new lap record here yesterday as he dominated the first qualifying session for tomorrow’s British Grand Prix — but then revealed his fears that the sport’s monster bikes are becoming too powerful.
The Italian, who has won here for the last three years and chasing his fourth victory of the season, clocked 1min 31.196sec on his Honda with Australia’s former world superbike champion Troy Bayliss snatching second place on the improving Ducati. However, after setting such a blazing pace, Rossi then said the four-stroke bikes, which are capable of speeds of up to 200mph, are becoming far too powerful to handle.
“It’s possible to build four-stroke bikes with 300 horsepower tomorrow but the question is, who will ride the bike?,” asked Rossi. “Already the bikes are faster than last year and I think we are at the limit. At the moment it’s possible to handle the speed of the bikes.
“We’re traveling five or six miles per hour faster than we were on the 500cc machines so the difference at the moment in the top speed is not very big. But 10 miles per hour more? No.
“Over the last five or six years of the 500cc machines, the improvements came with the tires but the bike itself basically remained the same.
“With the new four-strokes we’ve already been able to work out how to go one second faster at every race.
That’s very good but it also brings with it risks and there needs to be some rules so the bikes aren’t built to go too fast.” Bayliss overcame a crash in morning practice but his experience of the track from his superbike days paid dividends in qualifying as he was just 0.082sec off the pace of the Italian.
The provisional front row was completed by Sete Gibernau, on a Honda, and Yamaha rider Carlos Checa.
However, it was a miserable day for Rossi’s great rival Max Biaggi who could only manage ninth place on his Honda — 0.665sec off the pace, with Loris Capirossi, Olivier Jacque, Tohru Ukawa and Colin Edwards ahead of him.
