COOLANGATTA’S world IDM Superbike champion Karl Muggeridge took a second-row start after yesterday’s final qualifying session of the first round of the IDM Superbike Championship at Lausitzring, Germany.

Muggas and his team decided to use the morning qualifying session to set up their HRP Honda team bike properly and went into the afternoon session as fourth-fastest after some good lap times on the race tyres.

When they put the qualifier in, however, Muggas had a small problem with his CBR.

He fell off at high speed, which pretty much destroyed the bike and ensured the team will put in a long night shift to get it ready in time for the two races today.

Ducati rider Dario Giuseppetti took front row at his home round, followed by three KTM riders, Stefan Nebel, Matej Smrz and Martin Bauer.

“In the first session this morning we only used the race tyre to save the qualifying tyre for this afternoon, which gave us an opportunity to finalise some settings for the bike,” Muggeridge said.

“This afternoon we entered the track on the same race tyre as this morning and returned to the box after two laps to put in a qualifier, but three-quarters around the lap I had some small problem and slid off at a relatively high speed and the bike was completely damaged.

“Naturally I was unable to finish or make any more laps for this session, which basically concluded my day.

“We were lucky enough to keep the second row of the grid, so it’s gonna be a tough couple of races but I wasn’t going to expect anything else.”

Muggeridge was eight-fastest overall in the field.

“I had some small problem and slid off at a relatively high speed.”