Alvaro Bautista on good pace despite FP4 crash

The Team GO&FUN Honda Gresini endured a tough day today at Brno: Alvaro Bautista and Scott Redding were not able to enter the Qualifying 2 session, which decides the first twelve positions on the starting grid, and therefore tomorrow they will start side by side from the fifth row with the 14th and the 15th fastest time, respectively.

A fall during FP4, just before the Qualifying 1, prevented Bautista to use the bike with which he had achieved a better feeling thanks to a slight change in the chassis geometry. With the second bike Alvaro set a lap time of 1’57”428, closing the Q1 in fourth place.

ALVARO BAUTISTA (14th – 1’57″428)
“Today I crashed in FP4, just before the Qualifying 1 session: when I started to brake, I lost the front end immediately. I don’t know if there was something strange on the track surface, but I saw that Rossi crashed in front of me in the same way. Luckily I haven’t sustained big injuries. Before the crash we tried a different chassis geometry on my first bike, which helped me to get more rear grip, but then after the crash I had to make the Qualifying 1 with the second bike, with the old set-up, so I couldn’t improve a lot my lap times. The qualifying was not good, but with the new set-up we have been a little bit more competitive during FP4, so I’m confident ahead of tomorrow’s race: we will try to make a good start and then to keep our pace, that is not too bad”.

Source: Gresini Racing