Hodgson on Daytona 200 pole

By John Hopkins

DAYTONA BEACH, FL -- Neil Hodgson claimed pole position for the 67th Daytona 200 by Honda, turning a fastest lap of one minute, 39.347 seconds (106.898 mph) in qualifying on Thursday aboard his factory Honda CBR600RR.

The Attack Kawasaki duo of Chaz Davies and Steve Rapp will line up alongside Hodgson on the front row for Saturday's race, the opening round of the AMA Formula Xtreme Series, with the second American Honda CBR600RR of Montreal's Miguel Duhamel completing the front row of the grid.

Davies turned a lap of 1:39.436 on his ZX-6R while Rapp, the defending race champion, turned a best time of 1:39.779. Duhamel's fastest lap was a 1:39.836.

The two Hondas are on Dunlop tires while the Attack Kawasakis are on Pirellis.

"I didn't think it was a particularly good lap," said Hodgson, the first Englishman to qualify on pole for the 200 since Paul Smart in 1974. "I thought it was a safe, good qualifying lap."

Hodgson suffered a fall later in the session when he tucked the front end exiting turn 4, but apart from winding himself he was uninjured and able to return to the pits.

Duhamel's effort represented a major improvement from practice on Wednesday, when he was only 12th fastest with a time over two seconds slower than his qualifying effort.

"The bike was set up too soft in testing, and yesterday too," the five-time 200 winner explained. "Obviously it was a major problem and we made it a little bit better. The two trucks work closely together and we took some quotes off Neil and obviously it worked."

He set his time on race tires with 17 laps on them, he explained, taking advantage of a tow from fellow Honda rider Josh Hayes and the M4/EMGO Suzuki GSX-R600 of Martin Cardenas.

Defending Formula Xtreme champ Hayes qualified fifth with a 1:39.879 on the Erion Honda CBR600RR ahead of teammate Jake Zemke.

The second row is completed by the Celtic Racing Suzuki GSX-R600 of Michael Barnes and the Rockwall Honda CBR600RR ridden by Aaron Gobert.

Scott Decker of Fort Saskatchewan, AB set the 62nd best qualifying time of 1:48.374 on his Suzuki GSX-R600.