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maggio 19, 2018 - KTM

MotoGp - Qualifying - Smith & Espargaro primed for French Grand Prix from the sixth row of the grid

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QUALIFYING 5th Rd. #motogp 2018, #lemans (FRA)

A promising early showing by Red Bull KTM Factory #racing at the historic setting of #lemans for the Grand Prix of #france converted into sixth row grid slots for #bradleysmith and #polespargaro for the fifth round of nineteen in 2018 #motogp tomorrow afternoon.


MotoGP
The Brit and Spaniard circulated to top ten positions in FP1 on Friday and #polespargaro was a very encouraging 7th in FP2 the same day. Warm and breezy conditions were again in place for Saturday’s action and both riders continued work on the KTM RC16 with a view towards the 27 lap distance at 14.00 on Sunday. #bradleysmith struggled with inconsistent rear tyre grip and posted a time for 17th in Q1. Espargaro went for broke and was lucky to escape unharmed from a highside crash on his second flying attempt and ended the period with 18th place.

Smith: “Everyone seems to be suffering with the same sort of problem at the moment and maybe having one of the softer compounds of the season here has something to do with it. It might be a false feeling of grip or some deformation. I don't believe it is down to the surface of the track. Michelin usually has such a lot of grip in the rear but it is catching us out a bit. I’m still trying to figure it out and some #people are managing it. Here at #lemans the corners are so long that you spend a lot of time on the side of the tyre and any issue is exaggerated. We are trying to find the key. The soft rear seems to be working better than the medium but I can ride with both so we’ll see tomorrow. Hopefully we’ll be going for points.”

Espargaro: “Today didn't really go to plan. I almost flew on my first lap and then crashed on the second so I could not get that lap-time that I knew was possible. I went into the corner faster and got on the throttle earlier and it finished with a highside. It was a risk, but it was qualifying! I’m a guy that gives everything; I do not leave anything in the pocket. Anyway, I’m not super-sad because we have what we need and the rhythm was nice in FP4. We took too much risk on this track and with the tyres we have. We’ll try harder tomorrow morning and I think we’ll enjoy the race.”

Sebastian Risse (Technical Director MotoGP): “To be fair we feel quite comfortable with our bike at this track. Of course the asphalt is sometimes quite cold and it might be on the limit with the tyre allocation because we see #people running soft compounds but overall the bike is not so bad. The lap-times generally in Q2 were incredible and we have big respect for that. We think we could have done a bit better in the sessions and it was not so easy because of crashes and some other difficulties. But I’m quite confident tomorrow and I think we can have a good race. The target is top ten or more.”

Moto2 & Moto3
Sam Lowes was the best qualifier on the KTM Moto2 with 7th position, just ahead of Red Bull KTM Ajo’s #bradbinder and Miguel Oliveira on tenth place.

Binder: "This weekend started out very tricky and it continues to be so, so getting eighth in qualifying is very good. The conditions are very difficult; it's easy to lose the front and crash, and there have been many riders who went down throughout the day. Tomorrow it will be important to be smart; for us it will be a race of survival, because I think there will be many crashes. I need to find the right pace for the race during the Warm Up and from there we will be ready to face the race with the desire to score as many points as possible."

Jakub Kornfeil placed his Redox Pruestel GP KTM RC250 GP into 2nd for the Moto3 QP session and sits in the middle of the first row for the opening race of tomorrow’s Grand Prix programme. Three other KTM machines fill the top six with Darryn Binder having also his best qualifying this season starting from 13th place tomorrow.