ENEA CRASHES OUT IN Q1, GRESINI RIDERS IN ARREARS AT PORTIMAO
Saturday’s on-track action at Portimao has drawn to a close for Team Gresini MotoGP with both riders once again held back by very changeable weather. After the pouring rain encountered in the morning and the mixed conditions of FP4, Q1 started with wet tyres and ended with four dry on slick tyres. Fabio Di Giannantonio did well in opting for slicks straight away. He first had time to test the tracj conditions before setting a decent lap-time for a 15th place in qualifying.
A very unlucky Enea Bastianini had a similar strategy to his teammate, but crashed out on his last quick-lap attempt while having a great margin (-0.360s) for a possible access to Q2. He was thrown off his bike at turn 5, with the Italian rider who hit his right wrist hard which will not prevent him for tackling tomorrow’s GP (starting at 13:00 GMT+2).
15th – FABIO DI GIANNANTONIO #49 (1’49.639s)
“We saved the day because I don’t feel good at all in the wet and also due to the changeable weather we couldn’t improve the feeling today, either. We had to either play it safe with wet tyres or take a gamble with slicks and in the end we were rewarded. I hope we’ll race in dry conditions tomorrow, even though having never raced here with a MotoGP bike will be a challenge nevertheless.”
18th – ENEA BASTIANINI #23 (1’50.618s)
“We took a big hit and it’s a shame. We took to the track with the idea of setting a time with wet tyres and we did. Then I saw that the track was drying up and I decided to try again but with slicks on. I didn’t manage to warm the tyres up enough and I went too far. The right wrist hurts quite a bit but nothing is broken I’m sure. So we’re ready to attack tomorrow.”
