Maverick Viñales qualifies 5th in Spain, Aleix Espargaro 6th

An exciting final qualifying session at Jerez de la Frontera in Spain this afternoon saw Team SUZUKI ECSTAR’s Maverick Viñales and Aleix Espargaró position their GSX-RRs fifth and sixth on the grid for tomorrow’s fourth round of the MotoGP™ World Championship.

Viñales, who was running 11th in the closing stages of Q2, put in a personal best-lap of 1’39.581 on his eighth and final lap to put the 2016 GSX-RR in the middle of the second row, while Espargaró sits beside him after his seventh and final lap-time of 1’39.588.

Today proved positive all round with both Viñales and Espargaró consistently strong in FP3, where they both earned automatic qualification through to the all-important Q2; and they showed a consistent feeling with their machines. The FP4 was also a beneficial and positive one as both riders focused on finding a good race-pace, which proved them to be competitive also.

Maverick Viñales:
“The second row is a good place to start from, but I’m not completely satisfied. In all sessions I felt really comfortable, while in qualifying I struggled more. Finally I decided to put in a ‘do-or-die’ lap and I did it, but for sure we have some work to do. I’m still struggling with the rear grip, we lack in traction, which prevents me to from being even faster. Maybe the first row was reachable, although the first three in the classification did impressive times. The race-pace leaves me confident; we did several tests and I’m ok, so if I’m able to make a good jump, I really think I can stay in the pack and fight with the front riders.”

Aleix Espargaró:
“I’m totally happy that I finally found back the feeling with my GSX-RR. With my crew we are doing a massive amount of work and it is now paying off. I struggled with the softer rear tyre the whole weekend, not being able to set-up the bike properly for it. We did several tests but at the moment we cannot exploit it with our configuration. But this is also good: I did my qualifying with the harder tyre and I’m in sixth, which is not bad. Tomorrow I will need a good jump at the start and keep contact with the leaders; according to the race-pace I tested in FP4, I know can be competitive. We did a long-run simulation and I’m totally confident as I scored very interesting times that were very consistent.”

Source: Suzuki