by VALERIO BARRETTA
Le Mans, Marquez disappointment
For the first time this season the brothers Marquez they will both start from Q1. At Le Mans it is above all the eight-time world champion who has wet dust: in the Tests there was a fall at the start of the session and a decisive error in turn 6 in the last time attacks. Episodes which, combined with the yellow flag of the penultimate fast lap following Enea Bastianini’s fall, forced the former Honda rider to 13th place and to play for pole by going through the Q1 trap.
The words of Marc Marquez
But can this Marquez challenge for pole position? Certainly today’s Marquez, with today’s bike, would struggle a lot. He himself admitted his difficulties in feeling with the GP23, even before the crash: “It was an unexpected day, but I had warned that there would come a Friday when this would happen. It happened today at Le Mans and now is the time to react. In the afternoon, right from the start, I didn’t feel very comfortable, neither with the set-up nor with my riding style. Q1 is not a session that drives me crazy, it will be complicated and fundamental, and there will be a lot of work to do to be competitive tomorrow“, this is his comment to Brand.
“In the penultimate time attack I was doing well but I found a yellow flag; in the last one, I was doing well and I made a mistake. These things happen, but if you have the pace you also have more margin. The fact is that I would have narrowly passed. We need to improve because our pace isn’t good either, And today for the first time I fell because I crossed the limit”, he continued. “I think the direction we took in the afternoon wasn’t the right one, we decided to take the same direction on both bikes seeing how the morning had gone. Maybe we made the wrong choice, we’ll go back a bit and see if I can find the feeling I had in Jerez again. I’m already warning that it won’t be easy to get through Q1 if the sensations are the same as today”.
The words of Alex Marquez
“I only managed to do one time attack. We tried some solutions that worked well this morning, but not in the afternoon“, added Alex Marquez (19th) to the Gresini channels. “We need to take a step back, I had a setup idea that I thought would help me and that wasn’t the case. There is room to do well, but we need a calmer bike. Q1 is a complicated session and tomorrow even more so with many fast riders”.
