The Repsol riders completed an excellent qualifying session, with the Spanish rider placing fifth and the Frenchman sixth. Maria Herrera ended in thirty-first place.
Jorge Navarro and Fabio Quartararo shone this afternoon at the Austin circuit in a spectacular qualifying session, ensuring both riders will start tomorrow’s race from the second row of the grid on a track that was unknown to both until Friday morning. Navarro, who this morning finished fourteenth in the third free practice session, managed to lower his times this afternoon by two seconds, boosting him up to fifth place on the grid. His best time of 2 minutes, 16 seconds and 144 thousandths was just 8 tenths off of the time achieved by British rider Danny Kent, who ranked first at the end of the session.
Fabio Quartararo also made important steps forward in the qualifying session, which like his teammate, managed to drop two seconds off his earlier best time in the third free practice session this morning, where he placed eleventh. He moved up to sixth place with a best time of 2:16.150, just 6 thousandths off his teammate.
Maria Herrera had some problems with the brakes and in the qualifying session marked the thirty-first fastest time, just over three seconds from Kent.
Tomorrow the Moto3 race will be held at 11:00AM local time.
Fabio Quartararo
6th – 2:16.150, 30 laps, 165 km
“I’m happy because I rode all the qualifying session alone and I was able to get under my 2 minutes and 17 seconds after two dry practices; I thought it would be more difficult. In the end we managed to get a second row start, as in Qatar, and we’ll see how we go tomorrow. In the last Grand Prix I was in the same place and could fight for victory, but Kent has a really fast pace and it will be quite difficult to follow. We worked hard on the development of the bike, but I had only had two sessions dry because it rained yesterday. I like very much the circuit and I hope the weather will hold for tomorrow.”
Jorge Navarro
5th – 2:16.144, 31 laps, 171 km
“Yesterday we couldn’t ride in the dry and I really wanted to at this circuit, because the corners here are fun. In the morning I rode at a good pace from the start of the session: I focused on lapping alone and finding my own limit. At the end, we reviewed the telemetry with the team and we saw where we could improve. During the qualifying session I managed a good pace, so I’m happy. I hope that tomorrow the weather works with us and we can race in the dry. With regard to the short time we’ve had in these conditions I think I’ve adapted very quickly, so if it doesn’t rain we are ready to ride with the front group.”
Maria Herrera
31st – 2:18.631, 29 laps, 160 km
“In the morning we tried to adjust the bike for dry conditions at this track, as yesterday we could only ride in the rain, and it took us a while to find the right settings. It’s a fun circuit and I like it a lot, and every lap I improved a lot. But in the first free practice today I had some problems with the brakes and I also noticed I had them in the qualifying session, because I still couldn’t stop the bike like I wanted, so I couldn’t get into the corners as I wanted. In the warm-up tomorrow we’ll try to fix them for the race, with the objective to continue lowering my time and put myself in a more advanced group and to have fun.”
