West lacking confidence in tyres

The Kawasaki rider finished down in 17th place, nearly 1.5 seconds off the pace, after feeling unconformable riding his Ninja to the limit.

"Admittedly, I didn't feel much confidence in either the front or rear today; I'm getting a lot of movement both on entry and exit, under braking and acceleration," said West.

"The grip isn't sufficient at the moment for me to ride as hard as I'd like to. But we've tried a number of things today, especially regarding the suspension, and there have been some improvements.

"Still, we're going to discuss it further and come up with a good strategy to increase my confidence so tomorrow I can go faster."

West was nearly a second slower than teammate Randy de Puniet, who enjoyed a much better day after posting the sixth quickest time.

The Frenchman was pleased with his team's progress.

"We've improved the bike a lot, especially regarding corner entry and exit, and it's getting better all the time," said de Puniet. "Rear grip hasn't been a particularly strong area so we've been trying a variety of different settings throughout the day.

"I've been riding with a hard compound tyre on the rear and, because of that, I've had quite a few slides today. We did try a softer compound but, whilst it was better with grip, we have our doubts as to whether or not it will be long-lasting enough for the race. The front's fine though.

"It's a tight track and it's strange to come back to this sort of layout after the circuits we've been to lately. Certainly, compared to Malaysia, there's nothing like as much grip but tomorrow's another day and we'll see where we go.

"My times haven't been bad at all but, without doubt, with some stronger tyres I could definitely improve my times, raising me a few places and increasing the gap behind me."