Hopkins confident after 'sweet' practice

The American was in the top four in both sessions on the opening day, and was delighted to find that his initial set-up was very well suited to Laguna Seca.

"Basically we got pretty lucky coming into this weekend because the set-up we had for the bike wasn't too far off," Hopkins said.

"The crew did a great job to get it like that so we were able to start testing tyres straight away.

"Everything seems pretty sweet right now, I know there are a couple of places that I need to improve my lines and we need to get a bit more consistency. We need a couple more tenths and then we'll be right there.

"We'll all be working hard to get that and I'm sure that come tomorrow we'll come out and qualify great."

Hopkins' teammate Chris Vermeulen also showed promising speed as he went sixth fastest in the morning and then seventh later on.

"This morning with the cooler air temperatures we had some problems with the brakes - as I couldn't keep the heat in them - but the guys worked very well on that and sorted it all out," Vermeulen said.

"The bike set-up and the tyres from Bridgestone are all working well, and it doesn't seem to matter what tyres we put in they all work as well as each other. We will have to do some more tyre testing tomorrow to see which ones will have the best durability for the race.

"We made a lot of improvements today and if we can keep going in that direction I think we can hopefully qualify up the front tomorrow."