Elias happy with first day at Valencia despite crash in FP2
The curtain comes down on the 2011 MotoGP World Championship this weekend in Valencia at Ricardo Tormo circuit where Marco Simoncelli will be remembered, celebrated, and honoured. LCR Honda racer Toni Elias returns to home soil for the fourth time this year with high motivation with Marco on his thoughts like the whole MotoGP family.
The Spaniard has shown his determination in this morning first free session qualifying 8th (1’46.393) on a drying track but wet conditions marked the second premier class practice outing and the slippery conditions claimed several riders including Elias who crashed out of 6th place 15 minutes into the practice.
Toni Elias – 16th – 1’54.342: “It was difficult to return to racing this weekend after Marco’s terrible accident in Sepang, but I think it is the best thing we can do to honour him. Basically this morning I felt very confident and was pretty happy with the setting of bike one. I was missing some front and rear feeling but my pace was consistent on the damp surface. In the afternoon I went out on the same bike but after three laps I lost the front on turn two crashing out: probably I pushed too much. I rejoined the track on bike two but the set up was slightly different and we could not fix the problem with the time remaining. I did not have the same rear grip feeling but we have got a good base set up on the wet so let’s see how is the weather tomorrow”.
Source: LCR Honda