Until yesterday, Brad Binder honestly followed the path of a rookie in the premier category, progressing regularly on the handlebars of his KTM…
19th after testing at Sepang, half a second behind its leader Pol Espargaró, the South African came 2/10 closer to number 44 during the first day of testing in Qatar before conceding to him without explanation a whole second during the intermediate day.
On Monday, the eldest of the Binder brothers, determined to roll up his sleeves, was the second to go out on the track, just behind fabio quartararo. This worked out quite well for him since, according to his teammate himself, he was able to find himself at the right time with the right tires to achieve, during his 40th lap, a very fast time of 1'54.312 which propelled him to third position in the general classification: the paddock couldn't believe their eyes and some are already talking about heroes!
Certainly, the analysis sheets show that number 33 (for BB) only completed two laps in 1'54, a far cry for example from the 20 loops completed in this section by Maverick Vinales, but what's done is done and no longer needs to be done, and this performance certainly brings welcome confidence to the entire KTM clan.
In the end, the various successive improvements pushed the RC16 driver back to ninth position, but his gap over the fastest at the end of these three days remained reduced to 0,425 seconds, which in our eyes constitutes a great achievement!
Brad Binder : “I felt comfortable and we made some changes today that helped me a lot and solved a lot of my problems. I put a new set of tires on and… “BOOM!” The timer has arrived. To be honest, I was quite surprised. I crossed the finish line and thought: "No way ! I do not believe it". But it was good and pleasant to experience such a moment. »
“The bike was good. I felt more comfortable braking it, turning faster and hitting the gas earlier. Once we figured that part out, it was a lot easier to do a quick ride. Then I had to do a long run, which was very difficult. It's one thing to do just one fast lap, but doing 22 is no child's play in this category. As soon as the tires wear out, the rear wheel spins a lot. And it's crazy how differently the bike handles when the fuel runs low. »
“So I still have a long way to go, but now I’m happy.” We made good progress with this beast over the three days and the team was great! »
“The new KTM is a very good racing bike. Last year's edition was difficult. When I got on this new 2020 machine at Sepang, I immediately noticed that it was much, much better. »
“So I’m looking forward to continuing that at the Grand Prix. I will consider the Friday of the Grand Prix as a training day. Saturday, I hope for a decent qualification. I'm at the start of a huge learning curve. I'm going to see what happens in the race. My running pace isn't fantastic yet, that's for sure. My pace is okay, but too slow. But that was to be expected. I want to learn as much as possible during the first Grand Prix. I have to learn how the bike behaves over the race distance and I have to find out what I need to do as a rider to keep my times fast and consistent. »
Mike leitner, Red Bull KTM racing director: “We still had a lot of things on the list after Sepang and we managed to do them here, so the team and riders did a great job. The objective was to work hard on the bikes in order to find the final configuration for the race weekend. Overall we are happy and it is important that all four drivers are fit for the start of the season. I think there's clear evidence that we took a step forward with the bike between 2019 and 2020. Brad's time was very impressive for a beginner, but we looked at the longer runs and he did well there too. Pol didn't have a super fast time today, but we're not at all worried about his performance. The Tech3 guys have made good progress and, as we've seen in the past, lap times aren't always the priority during winter testing. »
Sebastian Risse, MotoGP technical coordinator: “From a technical point of view, we are ready. We managed to cover most of the important points of our testing program at Sepang, and we know that Losail is quite special in terms of conditions and how it changes between the day sessions and the night race etc. . So we focused on the race distance and knowing the tire specifications, especially for this location: everything went very well. You have to look beyond the list of times when you're here. I think we're pretty well prepared, but we struggled a bit with Pol today to set the best lap time. However, we know what we should look for and what we should do: so we are confident. »
Final J3 ranking:
Combined classification J1/J2/J3:
Credit rankings: MotoGP.com
