We knew he was motivated to take revenge for the twist of fate suffered in Catalonia, but Maverick Viñales is far from having disappointed today for his first day of testing on the Assen circuit.
Using an offbeat strategy this morning consisting of aligning laps without stopping to get his bearings, the Yamaha rider quickly moved to the top of the timesheets before tackling the settings of his bike.
He quickly found a good rhythm and held provisional first place for most of the session, bettering the benchmark lap three times to finish the session in 1'33.986s. This time ultimately earned him second place in the FP1 standings, 0.077s behind the rookie. Fabio Quartararo.
The Catalan rider maintained an impressive pace in the afternoon after starting by fine-tuning the YZR-M1 settings. He then set the third provisional time 15 minutes from the checkered flag. Then, after fitting new tires, Maverick Viñales signed the first lap in 1'32s of the weekend, followed by a 1'32.638s to cement his first place in FP2 and in the combined classification of the 2 sessions.
At the end of this first day, he has an advantage of 0.180s over his closest rival, Fabio Quartararo.
Maverick Vinales : “The feeling I have is quite similar to the one I had in Montmeló. I think I have improved my riding style and I am benefiting a bit from it here in Assen. But it's only Friday. We keep our heads down and work really hard for the race. It is very important to get a good result and create good momentum, so we will do our best. We force. We know the bike needs improvement in some areas, so we will try to do that tomorrow. Our main focus is the race and the first laps, so I'm going to do the same thing as in Catalunya and see if it works on Sunday. I will try to be at the front of the line, so that I can make a good start. I also have some things to try tomorrow to see if I can improve my pace a little, because other riders are very fast. We'll see what we can do, but regardless it's been a good day. Even with high temperatures, I feel good on the bike on hard tires, which shows that it works well.”
Massimo Meregalli : “Overall it was a good day for us. Maverick looks very strong and he feels comfortable. Even though it's only the first day, it's an encouraging start to the weekend and the best time bodes well for the coming days. In tomorrow's FP3 we will focus entirely on moving into Q2 with both drivers, and in the afternoon in FP4 we will put all our efforts into preparing for the race, as we expect conditions similar to those of Sunday's race. This will also be a good time to decide on tire specifications.”
FP2 ranking of the MotoGP Dutch Grand Prix in Assen:
Classification credit: MotoGP.com
