The free practice sessions had revealed Franco Morbidelli as the best card of a Yamaha clan in complete disarray. Between the widely commented sanction for cheating and cases of COVID-19 without consequences, a bubble seemed to envelop the drivers equipped with M1, without them being able to benefit from it. The performances are indeed modest, like this ninth place on the starting grid for the Italian-Brazilian who has given up nothing...
In this European Grand Prix in Valencia, you have to go down to the ninth time of Q2 to find any trace of a Yamaha . She is in colors, once again Petronas, since the two machines of the official team did not leave Q1.
It is managed by Franco Morbidelli who is ahead Fabio Quartararo whose performance, as long as the track remains wet, is more than discreet. But he who has entered into mystical communion with Ayrton Senna when Teruel Grand Prix hoped for much better. He regrets a mistake in choosing the tire in qualifying. The race is still to be written, but it will be, as No. 21 himself said, a lottery…
“Mir is the most liberated and does things well”
« Sunday, the Warm up will be essential for the race. We will need to shoot to collect data and understand as much of the track as possible. Then from there we should be able to have a good race. There seems to be someone controlling the clouds and bringing them out just before our sessions. It will be a lottery. In my opinion it would have been very different in dry conditions »Assures Morbidely.
The fifth in the championship 25 points from the leader announces that there is everything to fear from the official Suzuki : " Joan Mir goes very quickly, he seems to be the most liberated of all, even if I am not very far. He does things well. Today the conditions were too particular to judge the performance of the bike, they influenced the choice of tires and the desire to take risks. I'm a little sad because I was hoping for a better qualification but that didn't happen, I'm going to get back into the race » warns Morbidely.
MotoGP Valencia-1 J2: qualifying
