Simon & Forés Both Happy With Day One At Le Mans

As expected the arrival of a shorter and less technical circuit on the Moto2 horizon led to closer lap times and an entertaining battle for positions in the opening two free practice sessions. Sixteen riders are separated by a mere second on the time sheets and the general feeling is that any one of the top ten could be a candidate for pole position tomorrow, although Stefan Bradl provisionally holds top spot overnight. An oil leak in turn ten caused several riders to crash this morning and saw the red flags come out although thankfully nobody was injured.

There was plenty of hard work going on in the MAPFRE Aspar garage as the riders looked to establish a base setting for their machines at this track. Julián Simón worked on both set-up and tyre choice, lapping tenth fastest on a satisfactory opening day. Xavi Forés completed no fewer than forty laps as he focused purely on learning the track layout and he is confident of making up several positions from 30th overall.

10th Julián Simón 1.39.389 (34 laps):
“We spent today getting the bike set up and improving my feeling with it. We tried two very similar tyes and they both work well so we have a nice choice to make for Sunday. I am happy because my feeling with the bike was good, the lap times are close and the difference between the riders mainly comes down to what tyre they were on for their best lap. I didn’t set a good time on fresh rubber so I am confident that I have the pace. We are on the right track and hopefully we can improve tomorrow.”

30th Xavi Forés 1.40.362 (40 laps):
“I am quite happy because I feel comfortable with the bike, more so than I have been up to now. We are improving the set-up day by day and that makes it easier for me to find my lines and stay consistent over a few laps. We worked hard this afternoon on improving in the first two sectors because that is where we were struggling. It was just a case of doing that and trying to learn the track more. We are only a little over a second off the top time, which is positive because this category is so close and a second off your lap time can propel you up the order.”

Source: Aspar Media