Hot and very humid conditions greeted the MotoGP paddock on Saturday for the Thai Grand Prix at the Chang International Circuit. After a dry, but very exciting Friday for the WithU Yamaha RNF MotoGP Team in Buriram, Cal Crutchlow managed to repeat the team's best qualifying result today, with a P5 in Q1, a result Andrea Dovizioso achieved earlier this season in Austin, Texas.
The Englishman and Yamaha test rider, who replaces the retired Italian, gave his best today, after suffering a violent highside during yesterday's FP2 session. Cal Crutchlow left with a sore right foot this morning, but still managed to do a good job throughout the second day. He finished free practice in P15 overall and improved on his best time from Friday by 0,339 seconds in qualifying this afternoon to miss out on a Q2 spot by less than half a second. He will therefore start tomorrow from the fifth row of the starting grid.
Cal Crutchlow : " Obviously today I felt the effects of yesterday's injury. I woke up not feeling very fresh, that's for sure. But overall we can be satisfied with today's performance. I did my best. In FP3, after what happened yesterday, I was a little reluctant to push to the limit to try to get to Q2. So we went to Q1 and qualifying 15th is not so bad. But honestly, we are struggling with the rear grip of the bike this weekend. It's a bit due to the nature of the circuit, but also, with the Yamaha, we seem to have a lot of difficulties. Therefore, we will look tonight with the team and the Yamaha engineers, if we can improve this for tomorrow, because I think we can have a good race. My pace is good. I'm happy, but I know we can improve. So, we will see the situation tomorrow for the race. We have the Warm Up to try a few things. I hope the warm up will be in the dry, or in the wet if the race takes place in the wet, to have a little more time to understand the bike in these conditions. Overall, I think we did a good job again this weekend. »
MotoGP Thailand Grand Prix Qualifying 2 Results:
MotoGP Thailand Grand Prix Qualifying 1 Results:
Classification credit: MotoGP.com
