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PROVISIONAL TOP 10 FOR ALEIX AT THE ANDALUSIA GP IN JEREZ AFTER THE FIRST TWO SESSIONS

24 July 2020

Just a few days after the chequered flag waved over the season opener, teams and riders are back on track in Jerez de la Frontera for the Andalusian GP. This is a double Spanish event which marks the opening MotoGP 2020 season.

At the end of the first two sessions, Aleix Espargaró earned a provisional spot in the top 10 with the ninth best time, less than 7 tenths behind the leader. This position guarantees access to the second qualifying session (Q2), but it will need to be confirmed during FP3 tomorrow morning.

Bradley Smith focused on improving the RS-GP with respect to its reactions in the race last weekend, and he has rather clear ideas on what changes to make. The English rider will analyse the data collected today along with the Aprilia techs to find the best setup for qualifying and the race.

ALEIX ESPARGARO’

“This morning things felt a bit better and I managed to ride the RS-GP into the top ten. It should be said that, with three fast riders on the injured list, it was a bit simpler. In any case, tomorrow in FP3 we’ll need to push hard to hold onto this position. We had a few difficulties in the afternoon. Unfortunately, we are still losing a lot in acceleration and that is accentuated by the poor grip when the temperature rises. I hope I can improve for tomorrow. The goal is to confirm the top-10 position and take the bike to Q2.”

BRADLEY SMITH
“Today we decided to use the two sessions to work on the aspects that I had been least satisfied with during the race last Sunday. The conditions had caught us a bit off guard. Apparently, we still don’t have enough data on this new bike. The FP3 session tomorrow morning will clearly be a sort of qualifying. Everyone will be on the track with knives between their teeth and we’ll have to try to exploit the RS-GP as best we can in the time attack, but what counted today was working on the setup for Sunday.”