Aleix Espargaro: ‘I really struggled for feeling today’

The penultimate round of the MotoGP World Championship got underway in Australia today in the absence of the injured Yonny Hernández, replaced by local rider Kris McLaren, and Ben Spies. Casey Stoner came into his home round with injury worries of his own but he showed no signs of discomfort with his badly damaged right ankle as he proved once again that he is the king of Phillip Island, as the local advertising campaign suggests. The Australian may have a weak ankle but he dominated today’s proceedings with an iron fist, leaving Dani Pedrosa trailing by 0.8 seconds and Jorge Lorenzo even further adrift, as he aims for his sixth successive victory in his home Grand Prix.

Aspar rider Aleix Espargaró was not entirely today, meanwhile, and despite being the second fastest CRT on track he was unable to improve his fastest lap (1’33.727) from the morning to the afternoon and he is hoping to make big steps tomorrow.

13th Aleix Espargaró 1.33.727 (31 laps):
“I really struggled to get a feeling today. I could feel something wasn’t right with the front wheel this morning and I didn’t feel comfortable. The same issues carried over to the afternoon and we tried a different gearbox that I didn’t like so the performance was the exact opposite to what we were hoping for. We also had an electrical fault that brought the session to an early end but there is no need to panic – today was the day to try these things so now it is time to analyse everything and try to improve tomorrow.”

Source: Aspar Media