Bautista takes good step forward and qualifies seventh at Laguna Seca

After a difficult first day at Laguna Seca yesterday both Alvaro Bautista and Michele Pirro made important steps forward in final free practice and qualifying today. Alvaro improved his confidence with his bike around this track and made up positions to qualify seventh on the grid – his best qualifying effort at the twisty track by five positions – and a position he hopes to improve on with further improvements to his set-up ahead of tomorrow afternoon’s race.

Like the other MotoGP riders, the Spaniards lost valuable set-up time by missing most of the morning’s free practice, though he did venture out near the end of the hour.

Alvaro Bautista (7th 1’21”732) “Today went quite a lot better than yesterday – the only disappointment is that we hardly got any laps in this morning because of the fog and that probably cost us the opportunity to take another step forward. Anyway, we managed to try out a couple of different settings and in the end we found something positive which improved my confidence on the bike. My pace also improved, so that’s good. Obviously we are still not at 100%, but we have taken an important step. A third row start isn’t bad and if we can get away well off the line we can hope to stay with the second group, because the front three are on a different level. My objective is to rediscover the feeling I had before Mugello and have a good race.”

Fausto Gresini “Compared to yesterday we have taken a big step forward with Bautista and seventh place on the grid is not bad – it will give us the opportunity to run with the second group and hopefully fight for a result between fifth and seventh.”

Source: Gresini Racing / Honda Pro Racing