Alvaro Bautista goes through to Q2 for the first time at Misano

For the first time since returning to MotoGP, Aprilia went through to Q2 and Alvaro Bautista rode his RS-GP to the fourth row on the grid.

The Misano Saturday had started off well for Bautista, who rode an excellent third practice session. In fact, in FP3 the Aprilia Racing Team Gresini Spaniard put the tenth best time on the boards at 1’33.480.

The combined rankings of the three sessions valid for going through to Q2, however, relegated him to eleventh place, when Pirro’s withdrawal from direct qualification for Q2 opened up the doors to the session that decides the order on the first four rows of the grid.

In the decisive session, Alvaro did not repeat his times from the morning sessions, finishing in twelfth place, which earns him the fourth row of the starting grid tomorrow and is the best grid position thus far for the fledgling RS-GP.

ALVARO BAUTISTA
“This morning we were able to improve the good feeling I had yesterday even more and during FP3 I felt very good, both in terms of my flying lap and in terms of pace. And I am really happy to have gone through to Q2, since it is the first time. In FP4 we took yet another step in the evolution that I was not too convinced about, but we decided to keep the bike in that configuration even in qualifiers, trusting in the new tyres. However, I did not find the same good feeling as the morning, so for the warm up session and, especially for the race, we will return to the settings we had in FP3 that gave me a lot of confidence. This time we are in a good position and I am rather confident in the pace we will be able to maintain, so a good start will be very important”.

Source: Aprilia