It was a Pol Espargaró grimacing with pain who finished his first of three days of the German Grand Prix. It must be said that he fell twice in a few minutes during FP1, the last one turning out to be a violent ejection from his RC213V then fitted with “preheated” hard tires. He dwells on this type of rubber to better reveal its pitfalls while he does not throw stones at the new RC213V, actually faster than its predecessor... but the competition has worked much better!
Before talking technical, we must focus on the driver. And Pol Espargaro admits that he will undoubtedly experience torture until Sunday evening on the overheated turnstile of the Sachsenring… “ My elbow and ribs hurt. I can't breathe well, every time it feels like something is stabbing me in the lungs. It’s a big handicap for me, especially when braking and in left turns.” The Spaniard adds: “these are the same problems that I had after the fall in Valencia, I am gradually getting used to this pain ».
The first day was therefore difficult for Pol Espargaro in Germany. The team driver Repsol Honda Team finished the opening day of the Sachsenring with a lot of pain in its body and with a 14th position in the combined time which neither Pol nor the HRC officials are satisfied with. And for good reason: the Honda has gone from the bike to beat to the one to avoid…
But why this second fall with his second motorcycle shortly after the first? The one who is said to take the direction of Tech3 KTM for a beautiful reunion already explains the first: “ I braked hard, it was the start of testing and you still have a bit of margin, but there had been a few crashes before and I understand that the track at that time and in that place was a bit dirty. I wanted to push, a little more than I should have, and I lost the front, a normal fall ».
Pol Espargaro: “ I fell with a preheated tire from who knows when«
After quickly returning to the box, number 44 took his second RC213V, did two laps then lost control of his bike again in the same corner, number one, this time being thrown off his machine before to hit the asphalt violently. “ The second was the hardest, I had to leave with new tires because the other bike was still entering the box ", recalls Pol, obliged to use " a preheated, hard tire, from another weekend, from I don't know when ". The plan was to mount this hard rear tire, do the minimum number of laps required by the regulations and then return it to Michelin never to be used again, but the plan went awry before returning to the pits: “ we rode it to do three laps then rule it out and not do it again another weekend because the performance of these tires is still quite low. I was going quite slowly, really, I wasn't pushing very hard ».
The fact remains that for tomorrow, Saturday, he hopes to get back on the new chassis with the swinging arm that he has already tested in Barcelona and of which he only has one unit left. It will therefore be forbidden to fall… Otherwise, this Honda? Pol Espargaro recognizes it faster than the old version. But the opponents did much better…: “ Taka did a 20,6 lap, I did a 20.8, a few tenths slower but it's a lot faster than last year's FP2 which was a 21.1. We gained five tenths, so the bike is much faster than last year ».
Despite the fact that the 213 RC2022V proves to be more competitive in Sachsenring that a year ago, Honda's problem was the step forward taken by other factories, notably Ducati, with six drivers in the top 5 on Friday and with Pecco Bagnaia breaking the track record: “ the problem is that we have progressed by five tenths, but the others progressed by more than a second, so it's complicated. Everyone is progressing and everyone is going very fast and we are faster, but not much », concludes the Catalan.
MotoGP Germany J1: times
Credit classification motogp.com
