Saturday ends with the traditional press conference following qualifying. For the record, it will be Marc Marquez, Hector Barbera and Valentino Rossi who will make up the first row of the starting grid tomorrow at the Sachsenring.
Marquez signs the 62nd pole of his career in Grand Prix, the 34th in MotoGP. Leading the provisional ranking ahead Jorge Lorenzo, he hopes to take advantage of the Mallorcan's weaknesses this weekend to gain even more of an advantage in the rankings, “ A new pole position on this track, I'm really delighted,” says Marquez. “ I didn't have a good feeling during the last free practice session, we tried many settings on the bike. For the race I feel Rossi is close in race distance and I think Dani is not that far away in race pace."
Tomorrow, if the rain should spare the Moto3 race, it should return for the start of the MotoGP race, “ It looks like the temperature will be colder tomorrow,” adds the Honda driver. “ That would be a good point for us, but the rain wouldn't be. » Over the first two days, Marquez encountered some scares riding the RC213V, “ It's something we're used to. I think this is an electronics related problem and we will try to correct it. Because of this, we are forced to be careful on a few turns. » Note that Marquez tested a new chassis this morning in the first half of FP3, before setting the reference time on his previous chassis.
His teammate Dani Pedrosa set the 9th fastest time of the session after being excluded from the Top 10 at the end of the first day, “ It's hard to say, maybe Dani is not on his best days. I had an excellent start to the season. I think that leading the championship gives me additional motivation which can make the difference.«
Second on the grid, Barbera signs his best result of his career in MotoGP after his third place at Mugello in 2012, “ I think this season is really important for me and I'm happy, very happy, because this track suits me. "Nevertheless, the Avintia Racing driver is realistic for the race tomorrow," I think on one lap it might be easier, but I think I can fight for 5th or 6th place.«
Red is Marquez's first opponent on the grid. The Italian, first Yamaha rider, will start from third place on the grid, “ Yesterday was really bad, because we suffered from the lack of temperature on the front tire,” he declares. " This day was much better and we managed to make progress with the bike: the grip on the track improved as the temperature rose and I was quite fast. The question remains the weather: in the dry, we are competitive, even if Marc is a little faster. If it is very cold we will have a lot of problems because we cannot control the bike, even if it rains.«
The Italian says he likes this track, but that it does not correspond to the Yamaha which requires more space in curves, even if the main problem remains the temperature, “ Our problem remains the soft front tire which is still too hard for us. It is difficult to heat it up. If we had a slightly softer tire it would go better.«
About Lorenzo, Red replied, “IHe thinks he was already fast before his crash in Q1. But I also think that his fall must have affected his concentration."
En Moto2, we had to go back to the British Grand Prix to find Takaaki Nakagami in pole position, “ We are quite competitive and I knew I could take pole position if I didn't make any mistakes,” explains the Japanese. “It’s another chance to win again and I’m hoping for a dry race tomorrow."
« Since the Italian Grand Prix, I feel better and better on the bike. I just missed pole position there. In Barcelona, I finished on the podium. In Assen, the weather was tricky. For me, it's good to be here today. Since Silverstone in 2013, I have worked and tried a lot, and today I feel stronger.«
Enea Bastianini signs a second consecutive pole position after the Dutch TT in Assen. For the record, Bastianini is the last pole sitter to take victory in Moto3 and that dates back to Misano last season, “ The session was complicated with the red flag and the last lap was difficult with the traffic as usual, but I wasn't bothered. On the contrary, I was helped since I had a reference point ahead. We were competitive in all three sessions and hoped to do well in qualifying."
The Italian is hoping for a dry race tomorrow, “ The temperature increased this afternoon and some problems appeared on the bike. We worked to resolve them."
Photo credit : MotoGP.com
