Oliveira satisfied with conclusions of Valencia test and first shakedown of new Mahindra bike

The first 2013 Moto3 test was quite positive for the sole Portuguese rider in the MotoGP World Championship. Miguel Oliveira placed his Mahindra Racing Suter in 10th position of the combined time sheets, clocking a best lap of 1.40’526, which left him 1.2s from the top.

The youngster from Almada showed significant progress throughout the three-day test as he finished 0.6s inside last year’s pole position time. With all the work load scheduled for the test completed, the Portuguese Rider has his eyes now set on the next text within a week, this time in Jerez, a track where Miguel expects to evaluate the changes made to the bike and, above all, to test the Suter in a different circuit.

“Today the track conditions were very stable regarding the wind and the asphalt temperatures, which allowed us to do good work and see if the changes we made to the bike can bring us improvements,” started Miguel Oliveira.

“We proved the engine is trouble free, which was the goal for this test. Besides that, we were also able to see that we are already better than last year,” the young Portuguese pointed out, well aware of the competition he will be facing and of the Mahindra Racing Suter’s potentials.

“KTM is the reference when you talk about power and speed, but from what I’ve seen up to now, we are not so far away as last year. Besides, we are not using our engine at 100%; we rode at half gas to avoid wearing to much the components, to understand everything and to see what we can do in the future. The engine is new, we have to work a bit on every aspect of it, particularly on the acceleration. But we have a very strong engine to ride at high revs, which is very positive and very important, mainly for tracks with long straits, as Qatar and Sepang,” finished Miguel Oliveira.

Source: Miguel Oliveira Official Website