ALVARO BAUTISTA RIDES HIS APRILIA RS-GP JUST SHORT OF THE TOP-10 IN FP1, SECOND SESSION CONDITIONED BY A CRASH
IMPROVING SENSATIONS FOR STEFAN BRADL
The MotoGP Barcelona weekend, the second round of the 2016 season on Iberian soil, opened up with the two Friday sessions.
In FP1 Alvaro Bautista demonstrated a good pace straight away, riding his Aprilia RS-GP to thirteenth place with a time of 1’43.180, just over a second behind the top time. This is an encouraging start on his home track, a sign of the hard work carried out in the Aprilia garage. During the initial phases of the second session, Alvaro fell victim to a crash without any physical consequences, but compromising the planned performance for FP2. Back on the track with the second bike, with which he did not find the right feeling straight away, he was unable to improve on his time from this morning, and he finished with a 1’43.292 that places him in 16th place for the combined standings.
Lagging a bit behind was his Aprilia Racing Team Gresini teammate, Stefan Bradl, who finished the day in 19th place, but improving from one session to the next (1’44.009 in the morning and 1’43.502 in the afternoon FP2). In any case, the 37 total laps the German put in represent a good base on which the Aprilia engineers will be able to set up their analysis and the related decisions for the set-up to use tomorrow, when the starting grid order will be decided.
ALVARO BAUTISTA
“We started off rather well. In FP1 we tested the tyres more than anything, tending toward the harder tyre for the front. And despite the fact that the track is brand new to the RS-GP, I felt at ease straight away. But FP2 began with a crash. Hernandez came alongside me and I ended up on the dirty part of the track and lost the bike, crashing out. With the second bike I didn’t have that good feeling that I had felt in the morning. In any case, with the new temperature in the afternoon, we continued testing various solutions for the front tyre. On the rear I always lapped with the medium solution, but I think that the hard one could provide more stability, especially in acceleration. We still have not taken a final decision. We need to see the data and then choose between performance and consistency”.
STEFAN BRADL
“A demanding day. With the high temperatures grip becomes quite critical. Both of the tyres, front and rear, tend to deteriorate very quickly and that makes it essential to be able to look after them in the best way possible over race distance. Today we did not make very drastic changes to the settings between the two sessions. The changes are definitely moving in the right direction, but since they are important changes, it takes a few laps to gain confidence. We have a good starting base, so all that’s left now is to keep working, keeping an eye on tyre management, which will be the key to the race”.
