THIRD ROW FOR MARTIN AT SILVERSTONE AS DIGGIA FOLLOWS CLOSELY
Jorge Martin and Fabio Di Giannantonio have completed the second day of action for the Moto3 World Championship at Silverstone – the track hosting the British GP this weekend – and will start tomorrow’s 17-lap race from rows number three and four, respectively.
The young Spanish rider, who sat out this morning’s wet FP3 session to avoid troubles, rode well in qualifying as he stayed near the top of the majority of the session. The lack of a good slipstream and the pain in his ankle did not allow Martin to finish higher than ninth.
Di Giannantonio ended up three positions shy of his team mate in twelfth, with the Italian who was hoping to get a better position on the grid after encountering heavy traffic in the closing stages of qualifying.
Both Team Del Conca Gresini Moto3 riders are nevertheless confident ahead of tomorrow’s twelfth race of the 2017 season, with the podium being their goal.
9th – JORGE MARTIN #88
“It was a difficult qualifying because slipstreams are very important here and I rode most of the time on my own. I’m still happy, though, because I’m on the third row of the grid and therefore not too far from the top riders. I think the riders in front of me are a bit slower than me so it’ll be important to get past them as soon as possible to avoid Mir and Fenati pulling away. I will have to rider through the pain because this race is more difficult than expected. There’s a lot to improve with the bike still especially at the front, because tyres don’t last as long as we’d hope for.”
12th – FABIO DI GIANNANTONIO #21
“This morning’s session was pretty much useless, but it worked out alright should race conditions be similar. This afternoon we started out with the goal of doing a good qualifying session, but the heavy traffic on track didn’t help. During our last outing we started off well but after an almost clean lap, we still found some traffic that didn’t allow me to go better than twelfth place. This is qualifying position more or less in my standards, and for tomorrow I think we can aim for the podium.”
