Bautista takes big steps forward in solid qualifying

Rizla Suzuki racers Loris Capirossi and Álvaro Bautista will start tomorrow’s Indianapolis Grand Prix alongside each other on the fourth row of the grid.

Capirossi (P10, 1’41.512, 25 laps) will begin tomorrow’s 28 lap race from the front of row four, with team-mate Bautista (P11, 1’4.534, 29 laps) next to him. The pair both made steps to improve their respective Suzuki GSV-Rs around the 4,216m American circuit and they are confident that these measures will help them in tomorrow’s race. Capirossi is still looking to unlock some more of the potential of his GSV-R and will probably make a couple of changes in tomorrow’s warm-up ahead of the race, whilst Bautista made big advances with learning the circuit on a MotoGP machine and is confident that he can improve even more during the race.

Today’s qualifying was again held in warm and sunny conditions with track temperatures again over 50ºC. Ben Spies took his first ever MotoGP pole position, as he rode his satellite Yamaha to the front of the grid ahead of World Championship leader Jorge Lorenzo in second.

Tomorrow’s event is the 11th race of the season and the action gets underway at 15.00hrs local time (19.00hrs GMT).

Álvaro Bautista:
“We had a good qualifying and I was able to follow a pack that included Rossi, Dovizioso and Pedrosa and I didn’t lose too much time to them on every lap, so that was good for me as I needed to get an idea of how I was doing in comparison to other riders around here. After that I tried to push myself a bit more, but I still had a bit of a problem with rear grip and it made things a bit hard. We made some small changes to the bike and improved things quite a bit. At the end I tried to follow someone to get more reference points because they are so important here, but there was nobody to follow so I had to work alone and set my times by myself. I think our set-up for the race is not too bad and if I get a good start tomorrow and get into the group in front I can stay with them.”

Source: Rizla Suzuki MotoGP