Strong start for Lorenzo in Germany
Day one of the German Grand Prix at the Sachsenring circuit started with an incident fuelled free practice this morning as four riders crashed out on turn 11 of the twisty circuit. Yamaha Factory Racing riders Jorge Lorenzo and Ben Spies managed to avoid the mayhem and spent the morning getting reacquainted with the track.
Lorenzo picked up speed quickly in the morning session, rising to second midway and holding in the top three for the duration of the heat. As the track temperatures rose for the afternoon session so did the Mallorcan’s speed; only being denied the top spot at the end of the second practice by a gap of 0.095 seconds.
Jorge Lorenzo – Position 2nd – Time 1.22.320 – Laps 45
“I am pretty satisfied because I have improved my lap times today. I am almost faster than last year and I look forward to making another step tomorrow. We have made some changes and I feel much better on my M1; faster and more competitive! The slow corners are tough, but in the faster ones I take some tenths, especially T3 and T4. I hope tomorrow the temperature can be even hotter and we can fight for the first row.”
Wilco Zeelenberg – Yamaha Factory Racing Team Manager
“This afternoon went quite well compared to this morning. The track temperature was much higher and that helped set up and especially the tyres. Jorge was very consistent and we managed to improve stability and turning so we are quite satisfied. We did everything on the hard tyre so let’s see if tomorrow we are able to make another step.”
Massimo Meregalli – Yamaha Factory Racing Team Director
“We are not so satisfied on Ben’s side today, the set up is not perfect and the different temperatures from this morning to the afternoon didn’t give us enough opportunity to work as we wanted. We did improve a little this afternoon and now we will check and understand what we need to make it better for tomorrow. Jorge rode very well in both sessions; he seems very confident and has found a good set up quite quickly for the circuit.”
Source: Yamaha Racing