Guintoli certain injury won't affect race

The Alice Ducati rider fell just a few minutes into today's qualifying session at Estoril, and although he rejoined the session, he could only manage 18th and last on the grid.

"This morning we had a good rhythm. Then in the afternoon I slipped after only a few laps and I had to work with the second bike," Guintoli explained.

"I lost the rear part of the bike and in the fall I slightly twisted my ankle.

"Luckily it's nothing serious and some ice should let me be able to ride in tomorrow's race."

Guintoli's teammate Toni Elias took 14th on the grid and was the second-fastest Ducati, beating Marco Melandri's works bike, but took little satisfaction from the result.

"I can't be happy with the position," Elias said. "Fourteenth position isn't our objective. We have to accept the situation, but we can't do worse than this in the classification. This is a track that highlights the problems we have, therefore is not easy.

"I am not looking at the fact that I am the second-best Ducati rider on the starting grid: I prefer to exclusively concentrate on my work to improve."

Technical director Fabiano Sterlacchini was at least pleased to improve on Jerez qualifying, where both Alice bikes had been on the back row.

"Today's result doesn't satisfy us, but compare to the last qualifying session we can consider it a starting point," he said. "The things we had to try didn't give us the expected results.

"We have to continue to work. For sure it will hard and difficult, but we won't give up."