World Champion Joan Mir got off to a perfect start to his Portuguese Grand Prix. A satisfaction also shared in his box, because we had not seen the Suzukis at such a party for a long time at the end of a Friday. Until then, the GSX-RRs suffered in the free sessions leading to complicated qualifying, forcing them to return to the race on Sunday. But here they are already third with Mir and even fourth with Rins. The bike finally reacts to the change of tires for the hunt for the time. We will have to follow the blue bikes this weekend…
Joan mir could face this third meeting of the season, since he was forced to face it without his chief mechanic Frankie Carchedi, confined at home in Andorra due to an infection with Covid-19. But as for the departure of Davide Brivio, the organization Suzuki demonstrated his qualities of resilience by providing an effective response.
Nothing seems for the moment to shake the men of Hamamatsu led by Shinichi Sahara. A serenity that the results of the two free practice sessions of the Portuguese Grand Prix has strengthened. Joan Mir comments: " I felt pretty good right away in FP1, which made everything a little easier. I was able to be fast on all tire compounds and we managed a decent lap time with the soft ", reported the factory driver on Friday evening Suzuki in Portimao.
« We didn't have particularly good grip conditions on the track this Friday. But I could feel the new tire, that's positive. Usually we don't improve much with the new tire, here we improved by almost a second. It's more normal “, declared the Majorcan. We will remember that he had repeatedly emphasized his desire to eradicate the weakness of qualifications. “ Maybe we will have better grip on Saturday, at least I hope so. We'll see, but it's okay for now ».
Joan Mir: “there is a video call after each session”
The fact that his team leader Frankie Carchedi can only work remotely this weekend after the positive result of the PCR test does not seem to have had a negative effect on the Suzuki team of Mir until now. Tom O'Kane of the Suzuki Test Team proves to be a worthy replacement.
« We manage very well ", confirmed Mir. " Tom is very experienced and he doesn't want to show off, he just wants to do his job. Its very important. Frankie is in the background, he and Tom talk a lot, including Claudio Rainato, an electronics engineer. There is a video call after each session so I can explain the feeling a little. We're doing great work right now. And Frankie's not here, but I know he's sitting in a room, isolating himself and working like a beast. He has no distractions and only concentrates on his work ", ended Joan mir.
MotoGP Portugal J1: times
Credit classification motogp.com
