GOOD QUALIFIERS FOR BRADL ONCE AGAIN, FINISHING AMONG THE BEST IN Q1 AND RIDING HIS APRILIA RS-GP TO THE FIFTH ROW.
BAUTISTA TO START FROM THE SIXTH ROW
Valencia (Spain), 7 November 2015 – Stefan Bradl confirmed the good performance he has demonstrated in recent races today in qualifying, finishing the Q1 session in fourth place astride his Aprilia with a time of 1’31,824. It was a time that kept him out of Q2 by just 3 tenths of a second and earned him the 14th spot on the grid, on the fifth row. Alvaro Bautista, a bit behind his Aprilia Racing Team Gresini team mate in search of the best setup, finished ninth (with 1’32,282), which places him in the 19th spot on the starting grid.
For both riders the grid position will be bumped up by one place due to Valentino Rossi starting from the back of the grid. Bradl will therefore start from 13th place, still on the fifth row, whereas Alvaro moves up to the sixth row and the 18th spot on the grid.
ROMANO ALBESIANO (Aprilia Racing Manager)
“Thanks to Bradl we are confirming a good qualifying standard, especially on a track which is quite demanding for us given the agility required of the bike, speaking of which, the RS-GP pleasantly surprised us in that area. Alvaro had a bit more difficulty finding a good setup but I’m certain that there will be time for him to improve performance as well tomorrow and therefore do well in the race.”
FAUSTO GRESINI (Team Manager)
“Stefan did very well in qualifying today and his race pace is also encouraging, whereas we tried various setups for Alvaro without managing to improve, so we’ll try to use the warm up session to figure out what the best solution for the race might be. In any case, the results today show that we are getting closer to our rivals and this is very important.”
ALVARO BAUTISTA
“These were difficult qualifiers because I was only able to test the settings this afternoon which I then used in Q1. Now we need to see if this setup will work well for the race. We’ll also need to read all the data well, figure out what is positive about these settings and then make the right choices for the race. We will need to work in the warm up session as well, but both yesterday and today I did better in the morning – when I was able to put in my best times easily – than in the afternoon, and obviously the risk there is that the pre-race session may not be very significant.”
STEFAN BRADL
“I’m pleased with the result today, although at the beginning of qualifiers I was a bit worried because on my first attempt at a flying lap I wasn’t able to be very effective. On the second try, however, I was able to be more aggressive and in the end a good time came out of it and also a good starting position. I’m also pleased because in FP4 I consistently maintained a good pace. We tried different details in terms of suspension which unfortunately didn’t work, so we went back to the previous setup which is what we’ll use in the race tomorrow. I have a good pace and maintaining it until the end will be important because 30 laps are a lot. I’m confident because we’ve been working well and we feel like we’re ready.”
