CHALLENGING DEBUT AT MANDALIKA
Free Practices – #IndonesianGP After the overnight rain, team Gresini Racing Moto2 took to the track for the opening day of free practice. With overcast sky, the track – which was rated as fun and excellent by the riders – was surely not in perfect conditions, especially during the first session, with wet patches across the whole circuit.
Filip Salač finished the day in 30th position, after spending the whole of Free Practice 1 getting familiar with the track, while in the afternoon session a crash cost him half of the track-time available. He was able nevertheless to improve his lap-time in the final moments of FP2, as he narrowed his gap to the top down to 2.939secs.
Alessandro Zaccone showed promising signs in wet conditions during FP1 as he finished the session as the seventh-quickest rider. As the track dried up, he encountered a more difficult time; he will have to keep working on the set-up in order to improve his performance tomorrow.
28th – ALESSANDRO ZACCONE #61 (1’38.364)
“I felt good in the wet during the first session: I didn’t want to take too many risks, but we still managed to set a competitive lap-time. In the afternoon things were more difficult as we’re experiencing the same type of issues we had in Qatar. We will try a new solution tomorrow, hoping it will allow us to make a step forward.”
30th – FILIP SALAČ #12 (1’38.836)
“It was quite a difficult first day. The goal was to use the opening session to get to know the track as best as we could, and then try to improve our lap-times during FP2. Unfortunately I crashed at turn one in the afternoon – it was my mistake – as I ran over the white line at the edge of the track, which is very slippery. Fixing the bike cost us plenty of time and I also lost confidence with my Kalex machine, so once I was back out I didn’t manage to push to the limit. Tomorrow is a new day though, and a new opportunity to try and do well and hopefully to make my way back to the higher part of the timesheets.”
