Xerox shocked, but confident for Silverstone.

Silverstone Circuit is the venue for round five of the World Superbike Championship this weekend, but it won't be the legendary Formula 1 track that greets Ducati Xerox Team riders James Toseland and R?gis Laconi as they attempt to build on their positive Monza form.

After last year's high-speed thriller around the one of the fastest circuits in the world, the reigning world champion and his French team-mate will line up on the grid on Sunday for 28 laps of the shorter 3.561 km (2.213 miles) International Circuit, used in the popular British Superbike championship.

The main change is that instead of powering down Hangar Straight towards Stowe, the riders will now veer off at Becketts and head directly for Abbey before completing the rest of the considerably shorter airfield layout.

"I was a bit sceptical at first about racing on the short circuit because we haven't ridden it, but in fact there's not much there that we don't know so it should be OK" commented Toseland. "I really benefited from the Mugello test after Monza, because we tried a few things and I went 1.2 seconds quicker than last year so now I'm really looking forward to getting out there at Silverstone on Friday."

Team-mate R?gis Laconi was unlucky not to win race two at Monza after leading until half-way round the final lap, but the 29-year-old Frenchman is confident that his Ducati team is on the right track for the rest of the season.

"I believe we are coming better and better now," he said. "At Valencia I was on the pace but unfortunately I didn't race, while at Monza I was very close to the win so I feel that the bike is getting more and more competitive as the season goes on.

"I was surprised to learn that we are racing on the short Silverstone circuit, but for me it doesn't matter if it is long or short, I will give everything as always to get a good result. It will be important in qualifying to get the bike set up right for the tight chicane, because we go through there more times in this year's race. Now the circuit is not so fast, so the settings will be different, but it will still be a great track to race on."