Pol Espargaro disappointed at 12th place in Sepang qualifying

Monster Yamaha Tech3 Team rider Pol Espargaro will begin the Malaysian Motorcycle Grand Prix from the fourth row of the grid and confidently seeks to fight his way to a top result aboard the Yamaha YZR-M1.

The young Spaniard charged forward from the word go as soon as FP3 started and he continued his setup work in preparation for the race. After undertaking a total of 17 laps, Espargaro’s best time of 2’00.709 saw him finish in 10th and able to pass directly through to the QP2 session.

Here, the 2013 Moto2 World Champion keenly began his qualifying quest as he sought to seize a solid grid position for the 20 lap sprint. As the clock counted down, Espargaro laid down a lap of 2’00.794 on his 5th but carried on his pace as he aimed to move further up the grid.

However, despite his best efforts, this lap was his best as the session drew to a close and saw him only 0.142 from his teammate.

The 24 year old now fully intends to undertake a rocket start and then he will then seek to charge through the field in order to fight as close as possible to the factory MotoGP bikes in the 17th round battle tomorrow.

Pol Espargaro
“It was a disappointing qualifying session and even though we didn’t expect to be in the fight for the pole position, I felt that after FP4, we could have been a bit faster. However, our strategy as well as my feeling on the bike were not the best and the fact that I was only a few tenths faster than in FP3, shows that our potential was higher compared to what we achieved. Moreover, it was quite frustrating to ride my last lap behind Valentino and Ianonne, because I realised that there was a big difference between my bike and theirs, mainly in terms of power and acceleration. It’s really difficult to handle and also to accept as my ambitions are much higher than where we are at the moment, so I feel really frustrated. Anyway, we need to be positive and I can definitely say that we made a step forward at the end of FP3. Also later on in FP4, when we evaluated some different settings, I believe that we found something which increased my level of performance. With regards to tomorrow, I honestly don’t know what to expect. It will clearly be a really demanding race because we are experiencing one of the hardest conditions of my GP career but I will, of course, give my 100 percent.”

Source: Tech3 Communications