Maverick Viñales 4th on day one of the GP of the Americas, Luis Salom 7th

Maverick Viñales once again played a key role on day one of the free practice sessions in Austin.

The current Moto3 champion had two spectacular sessions and continued to surprise with his performance, like he already had done three weeks ago in Qatar, where he achieved the fastest lap, broke the circuit record and earned a fourth place in his first ever Moto2 race.

In Austin, Maverick achieved an ideal time just two tenths behind French rider Johan Zarco who holds the provisional pole

Maverick’s companion in the Pons HP 40 team, Luis Salom, also had a respectable first day of practice sessions on the Texan track and finished the day with the seventh quickest time in the Moto2 category, making a significant step forwards with regards to the setup of his Kalex.

Maverick Viñales – 4th place – 2.11.156
I’m happy with the start of this GP. We’re working well, continuing on from our work in Qatar and the pre season. We have to continue like this, remain calm and work hard to achieve our objectives. This category is very difficult with many very fast riders and you can’t sit back and relax even for a moment. We have a good setting and on Saturday we’ll continue our work.

Luis Salom – 7th place – 2.11.444
The morning went really well even though we still had a few things to improve. In the afternoon, things worked well with used tyres, we had a good pace. When we put new tyres on, we were faster and this makes me positive about continuing our work on Saturday, I feel confident that we’re capable to get ourselves in a good position.

Source: Pons Racing