#AMERICASGP FRIDAY: MARQUEZ SECURES FIRST Q2 WITH DUCATI
The third racing weekend of the 2023 MotoGP World Championship starts under the sign of Alex Marquez, with the Spanish rider who was competitive from the get-go in the free practice sessions at the North American venue.
After finishing the morning free practice fourth quickest, the #73 successfully defended his Q2 seed also in during FP2, while staying in the top five and lapping under the 2’03secs barrier. He will tackle his first-ever direct qualifying two session tomorrow as a Ducati rider, whilst looking for his second pole position of the season.
The other side of the pit-box was hard at work, with Fabio Di Giannantonio who struggled in the faster parts of the circuit, and will therefore have to go through Q1 for the third time in a row tomorrow. FP3 will be crucial to find the right feeling with the American track.
5th – ALEX MARQUEZ #73 (2’02.682s)
“The direct seed to Q2 was one of the weak points of this start of the season, and we managed to fix it today. I did a good lap, on my own, and this is really good confidence-wise because now we know we can be among the fastest riders already from the Friday. Generally speaking, we were competitive also in FP1, but we still have to do some fine tuning in the last two sectors in order to be in the first group.”
19th – FABIO DI GIANNANTONIO #49 (2’04.079s)
“It was a bit of a weird day because the feeling was a little bit peculiar: I can’t do what I normally find easy to do, meaning to be quick in the faster sections of the track. The bike understeers a lot and I can’t make it turn as good as I’d like. I’m covering a lot of ground and we’re slow. We need to understand how to improve and what to do ahead of tomorrow.”
