Disappointing qualifying for Bautista at Qatar: “We have changed a lot of things without improving the bike”

It was a disappointing night for both Team San Carlo Honda Gresini riders as Alvaro Bautista and Michele Pirro struggled to improve their pace in qualifying practice for the Grand Prix of Qatar. The Spaniard starts from row four in his MotoGP debut aboard the San Carlo Honda Gresini RC213V and still has problems with the front end of his bike, concentrating on improving front end feel, but never never reaching the point of confidence, so he wasn’t able to push it as hard as he would like. He is now looking forward to the warm-up session to test one last solution before heading into his first race as a Honda rider.

Alvaro Bautista (11th 1’ 56” 521) “We have changed a lot of things without improving the bike and I still don’t have confidence in the front. We are a long way back on the grid which is never good but we have the warm-up tomorrow to try to find a solution. Hopefully we can do that otherwise we are going to be on the back foot for the race, trying to finish it in the best shape possible. It is a shame and it’s strange because we were happy with preseason testing but here I just don’t have the feel. We’ll keep our heads up and keep fighting.”

Fausto Gresini “We hoped for a better start to the season than this but Bautista still hasn’t got the feeling to allow him to push on and it’s a problem we didn’t encounter in testing. Losail isn’t a good circuit for him and he had a bad injury here last year so I think that plays its part too. With Michele the problems are more understandable because the bike is so young but I still thought we could do better. Michele hardly went out tonight after a good session yesterday so obviously we’re disappointed but we’ll keep working and we’ll see! ”

Sources: Gresini Racing / Honda Racing