Brookes & Guintoli Suzuki surprise guys

While all the attention is focused on Honda and Yamaha, MCE British Superbike rivals Josh Brookes and Sylvain Guintoli could well be dark horses in the Suzuka 8-Hour as the pair team up with Takuya Tsuda with Yoshimura Suzuki. Completing a successful test last week and with Guintoli a key part of the Japanese tuning house’s development of the new machine for nearly a year, Brookes says that they’re not quite there yet, but they’re not far away. He said: “To try to get everyone comfortable on the same bike is a compromise, but the position is quite mutual between us, which is the first hurdle. The general set-up of the bike has us working in the same general direction, so that’s the second hurdle cleared too. “The third is our performance, and we’re about half-a-second or so off the pace, and it’s difficult to find that sort of time. But all three of us are on almost identical times, within a tenth or two every lap, so that means we can be consistent.”