Nico Terol back on form at Jerez, Jordi Torres struggles with setup issues
The fourth round of the Moto2 World Championship and the first of four races on Spanish soil this season got underway today at Jerez, home to the Spanish Grand Prix for the 28th consecutive year – making it one of the longest-standing venues on the calendar.
Some welcome spring sunshine saw the temperatures soar in the afternoon and the lap times in the intermediate class – the last to take to the track today – were somewhat slower than those set here during preseason testing in much cooler conditions.
The lap times could hardly have been closer, with less than a second covering the top twenty riders, but there was a familiar name on top of the timesheets as series leader Tito Rabat claimed the fastest effort of the opening day.
Fresh on the back of an exciting charge through the field that saw Nico Terol take his first points of the season last Sunday in Argentina, the MAPFRE Aspar rider continued on a positive curve today as he set a fast pace from the morning session at Jerez.
Sixth fastest this morning, just three tenths off top spot, Nico suffered the same set-up problems as the rest of the Moto2 field as they struggled to cope with the dramatic change in track conditions in the afternoon but he is happy with his first day’s work and confident of making more improvements tomorrow.
His team-mate Jordi Torres did not make such a strong start to the weekend, however, and despite showing good pace here in the winter tests he finds himself with a lot of ground to make up from 23rd position on the overnight timesheets.
6th Nico Terol 1.43.813 (36 laps):
“We started out on the right foot this morning and we are happy because the feeling was good from the first session. We missed the last winter test here because we went to Australia but we still managed to adapt quickly and set some fast times. I was leading the session for a while and finished sixth fastest at the end, three tenths off the top. Then in the afternoon with the warmer temperatures the bike felt completely different, the front was tucking in the corners and I couldn’t get any feel. We worked to get the bike turning better and I am satisfied with the result. Finally we are back up near the top. We will keep working hard tomorrow to solve the issues we had today.”
23rd Jordi Torres 1.44.745 (37 laps):
“We were hoping for a better start to the weekend here at Jerez but the bike didn’t perform well today. I wasn’t able to ride it how I like to and I know exactly what I need to do and where at this circuit. The bike just doesn’t go where I want it to so tomorrow we need to come up with a new plan and change some things to do with the chassis geometry to see if we can be more competitive. We made small changes today and didn’t make improvements so tomorrow we will do something major. This morning we worked from the base setting from Argentina and in the afternoon we tried the setting from the winter tests so tomorrow we will try to find the best of both.”
Source: Aspar Media
