After his magnificent victory at the Catalan Grand Prix, followed by an equally fine second place at Assen, Fabio was established within the Petronas Yamaha team in MotoGP for 2019. But before joining the stars, Quartararo experienced a rather difficult weekend at Misano, so he came out with a very honorable seventh place despite not really favorable circumstances.
On Friday, you were in 17th position after the first two free practice sessions. Did this worry you?
“It's true that this worried me a little because I was really struggling in all sectors, except the first. I took about two tenths of a second per sector, or more, while in the first sector I was third. This is a sector where you don't need a lot of acceleration, but we had a lot of acceleration problems during the weekend.
“Saturday morning was a little better, but I was still struggling, so it's true that I was a little worried. »
Fourth on the grid, your second best qualification of the year after your pole position in Barcelona, was that good for your morale?
“Yes, it was really good, because I have a weak point: I struggle to do a fast lap to qualify well. There I felt good to do a fast lap, but – as I said – I had difficulty with acceleration and that's also what made me lose places on the grid.
“What bothered me the most was not the lost positions, but the fact that I was being passed on the straight while accelerating, and that posed a big problem for me. »
After a good qualification in fourth position, you ranked 19th in the warm up, 0.9 behind the leader, what was the reason?
“I had an electronic problem which prevented me from doing the warm-up normally. It happened a bit like in Austria where the bike stopped after about four or five laps.
“The team took a long time to repair it, up to twenty minutes before the time came, so I was a little worried. This is why we were penalized and couldn't really ride well during the warm up. »
At the start of the race, you were fighting for 7th place with Jorge Navarro, in the group including Miguel Oliveira, Marcel Schrotter, Mattia Pasini, Joan mir and Brad Binder. Then you finished 7th in the sprint, 0.06 ahead Brad Binder, stating that he had a very difficult race. How did it unfold?
“My race was very difficult because I had a lot of difficulty accelerating. That's what penalized me because I think that for me, fighting for the podium in Misano was really difficult, but fighting with Mir and Pasini could perhaps have been playable. »
The next GP will take place in Aragon. You have raced there twice, finishing 12th in Moto3 in 2016 and 11th in Moto2 in 2017. Is it a circuit that you like?
“It's a circuit that I've never really enjoyed, but I've often had good results there. And as soon as we achieve good results, we of course appreciate the circuit!
“I went to do some testing in Aragon just after Barcelona, and we drove really fast there. It's true that I'm full of confidence for the Aragon GP because we had two days of excellent testing and I can't wait to arrive at MotorLand. »
Photos © motogp.com / Dorna / Fabio Quartararo personal / Speed Up
