Podium Success for Maverick Vinales at Silverstone

Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP’s Maverick Viñales pushed all the way throughout today‘s GoPro British Grand Prix, riding his YZR-M1 to a third-place podium finish.

Viñales had a good start and rode to fourth in the midst of a chaotic first turn. He was followed by fellow Yamaha man Franco Morbidelli and they had a bit of a tug of war between them for fourth place, but the Factory rider had the early race pace to get away. He started to follow his team-mate and caught up and swiftly passed him on lap 7.

The Spaniard was now in third place and had a 2.888s gap to close, but a scrap between leaders Álex Rins and Marc Marquez meant that the number-12 rider was able to make up time. He was inching closer and in the last two laps he was in contention. The gap was down to about half a second and Viñales was giving it his all but was unable to put in a move. He crossed the finish line in third place, 0.620s from first.

Today’s third place sees Viñales take over fifth in the championship standings from Rossi again, with two points between them. Yamaha remains third in the constructor standings, and Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP also stays in third in the team classification.

Viñales and Rossi will now concentrate on the coming two-day test starting next Wednesday at Misano, before they head for the Misano World Circuit Marco Simoncelli for the Gran Premio Octo di San Marino e della Riviera di Rimini, held from September 13-15.

Maverick Viñales:

“I don‘t know if I would have been able to make a move if I had been closer to the front-runners, because it‘s always difficult. I was closing the gap lap by lap, just a little, one or two tenths, but I couldn‘t close the big gap in just one lap. I tried my best and I think we got the maximum and maybe even more from our bike today. There are long straights here and at this track it‘s really about the engine, so we’re happy with third. We missed a bit of traction and top speed. In many corners I was much faster, but in others I was surviving the best I could. I think we improved the bike quite a lot during the weekend and that‘s the most important. At the test in Misano we’ll work on improving the grip. We‘re going to be very focused, do a good test, then we‘ll race some more, and we‘ll see what we can do.”