Jorge Martin close to front row at Aragon with best qualifying so far
All the Moto3 riders are clear that at this circuit it is essential to find a good slipstream to take on the back straight and the last corner. There were many riders waiting for a tow from their rivals in QP and Race Direction had a busy afternoon.
The traffic did not hinder the top riders too much, with the Spanish Moto3 contingent working hard at home and Portuguese rider Miguel Oliveira topping the timesheets for much of the session in QP, repeatedly improving his fastest lap.
Meanwhile Bastianini, the fastest man yesterday, again set the fastest time at the end of QP, with a brilliant circuit record lap – 1.57.755 – to take pole. Although the Italian is showing great form, it is expected to be a close race tomorrow with a very large leading group.
Having clinched the Rookies Cup title here last year, Motorland is a good track for Jorge Martin, who yesterday ended the day in fourth and today confirmed that spot on the gird.
It addition to his good performance the MAPFRE Team rider has worked solidly throughout the weekend. A small technical problem in the last free practice was no obstacle as Martin got his best World Championship qualifying result so far.
After missing pole by just 0.6s we expects to be one of the candidates for the podium tomorrow. There were mixed fortunes, meanwhile, for Pecco Bagnaia and Juanfran Guevara. Both the Italian and the Spaniard worked on the set-up of their bikes, but heavy traffic prevented them from moving up from 18th and 19th respectively.
4th Jorge MartÃn 1.58.412 (15 laps):
“Before coming to Motorland knew that it could be a very favorable track for us, so we’ve all worked hard so far this weekend. I didn’t want to miss the second row and we have met the target, but it’s a pity we couldn’t get closer to pole. I am very happy with the team’s work, this morning we had a small technical problem but my mechanics have resolved it quickly so that I had a perfect bike. The qualifying session was a mess because there were many riders waiting, I’ve saw one of them and almost crashed. The bike is working properly so we will not touch anything for tomorrow. Going forward I guess everything will be easier, I will not have to focus on moving forward positions as quickly. I guess tomorrow at the start of the race we will see a large group, and then, as the race goes on it will be divided into two. We will have to be very careful to avoid the other riders escaping and to remain at the front.”
19th Juanfran Guevara 1.59.054 (15 laps):
“Today was very positive, we continued doing a great job with tuning the settings and that has given us an incredible pace in the two sessions, especially in qualifying. In the second lap in qualifying, with the race tyre, I got my best time. Despite everything we tried to push hard in the last lap but the traffic was incredible. We have not had any luck, we could not find the exact slipstream to help us to reduce the time by a few tenths in the final sector. Although we have good pace we are slightly behind from qualifying, but the pace is important to achieve a satisfactory result tomorrow. Tomorrow if we go out strong and we get into the group we can gain positions, it will be a tough race and we need to avoid making mistakes.”
