Despite suffering a top speed disadvantage, Capirossi's best time was only 0.350secs away from the third fastest time, set by world champion
Casey Stoner, and but for a small mistake on his final lap Capirossi may well have been on the front row.
"I am quite happy today because this is the first time that we have had a good qualifying," admitted Loris. "We have worked hard to get the bike's settings right and it is now working well on race tyres.
"We still have a couple of options for which tyres to use tomorrow and we will decide on that in the morning. The qualifying and race tyres worked well and we have a good rhythm with the race package, and it will be good to start nearer the front.
"We will see what happens tomorrow as the forecast says rain which will be awful after all the hard work we have put in," he confessed. "Our target remains the same, which is to win races and get podiums, I know that will be hard here, but we will certainly be pushing for it!”
"It looked like we were going to have our first front row start of the year with Loris, but when you are pushing that hard sometimes mistakes happen," stated team manager Paul Denning. "He nearly crashed on his last lap, but he kept it upright and was still able to bring the GSV-R home for a second row start."
Capirossi's team-mate
Chris Vermeulen, a wet weather star, appeared inside the top five on race rubber before qualifying in an encouraging eighth place.
"Things have been a lot better today," declared the Australian. "The tests after the last few events have really paid off and
Bridgestone has helped out and brought us some new rubber that is a lot more competitive - so I am really thankful to them for that. My crew have worked really hard this week and we have had to overcome some major issues in some of the sessions - the guys have worked their hearts out!
