De Puniet hopeful of top ten finish

The Frenchman and his teammate Olivier Jacque have managed some impressive laptimes in pre-season testing, but both admit that the bike is still behind some of their rivals in terms of out-and-out speed on the straights.

However, with the ZX-RR proving nimble through corners, de Puniet is optimistic that he can shine at Losail this weekend.

"I think we've shown our competitiveness over the past few weeks and I'm happy with the performance of both our Ninja ZX-RR and myself," said de Puniet, who was fastest overall on the final day of testing at Jerez last month.

"The test is Qatar went well, although we struggled a little with identifying a race tyre, but we were able to do some more work on this at Jerez where we made a big step forward.

"We're still missing a bit of top speed, which will be a slight handicap at Qatar with the long straight, but we've already shown that we can make up this deficit through the turns thanks to the balanced handling of our bike.

"I will be looking to qualify as high up the grid as possible, and I will be happy if we leave Qatar with a top ten finish in the opening race of the season."

Jacque, who injured himself during the most recent Qatar test, admits he will find it hard to get inside the top ten but is looking forward to his full-time return to action.

"I can't wait for the first race; I'm really excited about making my racing return at Qatar," he explained. "We've had a good pre-season; progressing and always evolving after each test, now we need to carry that momentum into the opening race.

"My target for the coming weekend is to improve my lap times, gain some consistency and battle it out with one of the groups in the race. I don't know if a top ten finish is possible, as I'm still not completely up to race speed, but I'm sure it's going to be a close and fun race.

"This race is sure to give me a boost; I have been waiting a long time to be part of a full factory team and I want to make the most of this opportunity, starting this weekend."