Positive start for Dani Pedrosa & Marc Marquez in mixed conditions at Sachsenring

The opening day of the German GP at the Sachsenring was marked by a range of weather conditions spanning from cold but completely dry in the morning, to full wet in the afternoon.

Dani Pedrosa and Marc Marquez started the weekend well, securing top-10 places in the combined classification, which would grant them direct passage to Q2 should rain affect tomorrow’s FP3 session.

Dani set the third-fastest time in the dry FP1 session and the third-best in wet FP2, with Marc in sixth and second, respectively. Both riders have been consistently fast throughout the two sessions and look forward to continuing to improve their pace and their bike setup.

As previously decided in case of rain today, a new schedule has been issued for tomorrow, providing for 10 minutes of extra time in the FP3 session.

Dani Pedrosa
3RD (FP2 COMBINED CLASSIFICATION)
“We’ve had a positive start to the weekend. We had the opportunity to ride in the dry and in the wet, and we were able to lap well enough in both conditions. I’m happy with this but we still have work to do on the bike’s setup and on the tyres, to understand which one will be better for Sunday. We expected the weather to stay dry in the afternoon but that wasn’t the case, so we weren’t able to continue our work. Hopefully tomorrow we’ll be luckier with the weather. Anyway, at least I had the chance to lap at length in the rain and the feeling was good, as the new asphalt was quite grippy in those conditions.”

Marc Marquez
6TH (FP2 COMBINED CLASSIFICATION)
“Today was really positive. I felt good and strong in the dry this morning and also in the wet this afternoon. That’s important, as here you never know which conditions you’ll have to face. It now seems that it will be dry tomorrow and Sunday, but we can’t know for certain. We started from a good base with the setup, and I felt comfortable. Now we must pay attention to keep improving along with the track conditions; I think the new asphalt will get better step by step, and that could change everything. In the wet the grip was already amazing, and we were able to be around four seconds faster than last year. In the dry I think the potential is there, but with the asphalt still very new, it was a bit slippery. Anyway, we’ll see what the weather is like tomorrow, but we know that we’re already good enough in every condition.”