A weekend of disappointments
Saturday afternoon Spanish Grand Prix had seen the return of Fabio Quartararo on the podium, coming in third position in the Jerez de la Frontera Sprint. However, following an 8-second penalty for irregular tire pressure, the Yamaha Frenchman subsequently handed over the ‘bronze medal’ to Dani Pedrosa, who returned to an official GP as a wild card.
Rins in front of ‘El Diablo’
Twenty-four hours after a real race and elimination, Quartararo was unable to repeat the same feat, as demonstrated by 15th final position. A result which, for the first time this season, also saw him finish behind his teammate Alex Rins, 13th in his home GP. Protagonist of an excellent start, the #42 recovered positions also taking advantage of the crashes of the riders in front of him and overtaking Quartararo at the end.
The surrender at the end
The 2021 world champion, in more difficulty right from the start, also had to give in to Rins himself and Nakagami in the final for a arm painthus settling for 15th place: “I wasn’t able to make the same start as yesterday – explained ‘El Diablo’ at the end of the race – we had a rear grip problem and then the bike became very tiring to ride. I had pain in my arm because I braked too hard and in the last ten laps I couldn’t brake anymore, so I had to slow down. It was a very tough race, I would say. We lack a lot in terms of rear grip and cornering, so I hope that in tomorrow’s tests we can change things. I don’t expect a big step forward, but I hope to find an improvement to feel better on the bike and be faster.”
Testing information
Not even positive comments from Rins, ready to carry out the official tests scheduled for Monday again in Jerez: “Difficult race – he added – starting from last position wasn’t easy, but we started better than yesterday. I recovered a few positions and then remained behind Fabio for almost the entire race, until around 11 laps to go, when I lost a few tenths compared to him. Then I saw that he started to struggle like me and I managed to catch up and overtake him. I feel good. Surely It’s not the result we wantedbut this race was important for us because we have collected a lot of information. All the time we spend on the track provides us with data that we analyze and try to understand. For tomorrow, we have many items to try. So, let’s go ahead and keep working!”
