Races may be won or lost on Sunday, but Suzuki's Alvaro Bautista believes it's his Saturday performances that are holding him back.
The Spaniard hasn't qualified higher than ninth this year and, whilst battling for a top six at several races - including last time at Brno, when he crashed - the front group have long since escaped.
Bautista believes if he can start near the leaders, he will be able to gauge the exact potential of the GSV-R.
“We need to find out what the true potential of the bike is and I need to improve my qualifying performance," said Bautista. "It is difficult to see if we can compete with the guys at the front if I am starting at the back of the grid and I have to use so much time and energy to get up to them.
"These are things that we are determined to do and if we are successful then who knows what the bike and the team are capable of producing.
"I finished eighth at Indianapolis last year and I know we can do better than that now with the package we have. I will be pushing right from the start and trying to make all the hard work we've done in recent races give us a good end result in America.”
Bautista, who broke his leg at round one, starts round twelve of the championship in 14th, with a best finish of fifth, in the wet at Silverstone.
