MotoGP riders reflect on a rough for some Friday at Catalunya

2024 MotoGP World Championship
Round Six – Gran Premi Monster Energy de Catalunya
Friday MotoGP Rider Reflections

Aleix Espargaro – P1

“The weekend started well and I’m quite satisfied. The bike is working well. We knew that Barcelona would be a good circuit for the RS-GP24. As I crossed the finish line, I thought, ‘I’ll miss this feeling, this bike, and my team.’ The track doesn’t have much grip and it’s tough to figure out the right spot to accelerate, but I had fun in spite of that. This will be my last race weekend here in Barcelona, so I’m just thinking about having fun.”

Brad Binder – P2

“A couple spills today but in the end we managed to finish up in P2 , thank you to my team for fixing my bike so quickly in order to save the day.”

Pedro Acosta – P3

“Pierer Mobility worked really hard in Mattighofen last week, and twice harder after last year’s results in Catalunya. We arrived in Barcelona with good ideas regarding our bike’s set up, with interesting improvements, and I must say that I am more than happy with our first day with the team. Every day, we are understanding a bit more about how to ride this bike, and we are making good progress. Let’s see how tomorrow goes for us!”

Francesco Bagnaia – P4

“I’m happy as we did a good job and we managed to improve the feeling with used tyres. Surely the bikes ahead of us have a little bit of a bigger margin, but we have time and data to improve our situation. This year’s bike works better under braking although we lost something with regards to grip; this is especially true at this track, which is the worst on the calendar in this department. Still, we’ll find a solution for tomorrow. I’m happy with my time attack as I didn’t put together the best lap but the lap-time in the end turned out to be a very good one. We’re fast and we’ll keep working in order to be competitive in the sprint race.”

Jack Miller – P5

“We’ve been working hard all year, it’s nice to be back in the 10 on Friday, it’s just a matter of dialling everything in through the weekend now.”

Jorge Martin – P6

“Day 1 done.  Lots of info for tomorrow but we have work for the QP. Let’s go.”

Enea Bastianini – P8

“We struggled a lot, especially this morning as I wasn’t feeling good in terms of grip. We started the afternoon session with the same set-up but I kept struggling in full lean and I couldn’t find the right angle; towards the end of the session, a set-up change and also a tweak in my riding style did help. We did better with the soft tyre; now we need to understand how to find the same type of feeling with the medium compound. The important thing was to get into Q2 and we did it, now we have time to keep working on the set-up and to improve, because it’s clear that we need another step forward if we want to do well tomorrow.”

Alex Rins – P9

“It was a good day. It is always important to go directly into Q2. This helps a lot: you’ll start at least from the middle part of the grid. This morning, we were struggling a lot with the rear grip. It looks like this track was different from my usual feeling: normally I feel quite confident in low-grip conditions because I can find traction and grip, but this morning it wasn’t like that. So, we completely changed the set-up for this afternoon, and I was feeling much better. We are working a lot for the Sprint race, how to manage the tyre, and it was a good day. We were able to improve a lot from the morning to the afternoon.”

Maverick Vinales – P10

“Being in Q1 is extremely important. The sensations were not the best during the two sessions; I expected more. I also felt a huge lack of grip on the track. In terms of race pace, however, we are not far off.”

Alex Marquez – P11

“Obviously the crash didn’t help but it’s also true that feeling-wise it has been the best Friday of the season so far. We knew the Ducatis would suffer a bit more compared to other bikes, but it’s part of the game. We need to work ahead of tomorrow but the goal is to make it into Q2.”

Marc Marquez – P12

“I must admit that I wasn’t feeling very comfortable already in the early stages of the afternoon session and then I couldn’t make the most of the soft tyre. It’ll be hard tomorrow as we know that Q1 is the worst session of the weekend, but we’ll give it all and see how it goes. This is not one of my favourite tracks and this Friday confirmed my worries. Let’s thing about having a great Q1 and we’ll see from there.”

Miguel Oliveira – P13

“Practice was a little bit better at the end of today. But my feeling is very strange with the bike and I couldn’t really figure out what is going on – it’s really difficult for me to pinpoint a couple of issues. Mainly we need to find a lot of stability and rear grip, so we that is what we are looking to find tomorrow.”

Fabio Quartararo – P14

“I feel a bit better: the aero is doing what we expected and it’s helping. It’s a shame that we messed up the time attack. We took too much time to change one thing on the bike and lost time. I only did one lap on the second run, and it was with yellow flags, so I couldn’t set a time. If you check the pace, it was pretty good. But missing Q2 for this reason was not the best. That said, the overall pace is much better than before.”

Marco Bezzecchi – P15

“I was a bit surprised, I have struggle a lot when braking, especially on the straight. I can’t stop the bike well and then I have some problems when cornering. It’s a feeling that I already had at the beginning of the year, then in the last few races, we had made a good step forward, but here, with this type of grip conditions, I felt it again. We need to work on electronics and in riding to find a good balance and be able to close the gap.”

Raul Fernandez – P16

“In terms of grip, we know that it’s quite complicated when we arrive here. Today I didn’t really feel comfortable with the bike and although we tried to work on options, we didn’t find the right solution yet to go fast. To be totally honest, I’m a bit frustrated today, we didn’t find a magic button and we have to work it out. Aleix (Espargaro) is quite fast and everybody was expecting that we are a step ahead of the rest here. Although our bike is working well, we need to spend some more time to understand the situation. I couldn’t turn the bike and this is what we definitely need to work on now. We know we have more potential so, for tomorrow, we will try to understand the data from today better and change our approach for tomorrow.”

Fabio Di Giannantonio – P17

“We have struggled, especially this afternoon. I push a lot, but the bike is nervous when exiting corners, too reactive. I have no traction, I’m strong when entering corners and I often ride at the limit. It’s a shame about the two crashes, I don’t know if I would have been able to reach the Top10, but I certainly would have tried to make the most of the last 10 minutes of the session. Tomorrow will be a crucial day, the Sprint data on tyre management will be the key for Sunday’s GP. The goal is to do a good qualifying and get closer.”

Augusto Fernandez – P18

“The results don’t show it, but it has been my best day on track since the start of the season. Since this morning already, the feeling was good, and we did a very good Free Practice 1. We were also quite competitive in the first half of Practice, but the few areas where I felt uncomfortable this morning did not improve, and when I went for the time attack towards the end, I crashed, which is a shame. We know where the problem stands, as we lack a bit of stability on this low-grip track, so we will do everything we can tonight to solve this. If we manage to do so, we can have a good Saturday.”

Johann Zarco – P19

“We’ve confirmed some things we tested in Mugello, but we still need to keep trying and comparing, as the feeling was different due to the track conditions. I felt comfortable in the afternoon despite the position. Let’s see if we can take a step ahead of tomorrow’s Sprint.”

Takaaki Nakagami – P20

“It’s been a demanding day; we still struggle due to a lack of rear grip. However, I’ve improved my laptime compared to last year, but it’s not enough. Today, we’ve mainly worked on the race pace ahead of Sunday, as the tyres will play a key role”.

Joan Mir – P21

“I felt really good in the morning, and I was expecting to keep building. Today was a tricky day and we couldn’t accomplish what we wanted in the afternoon. There is still room to improve and in the last few races we have been able to take this step overnight, so we stay focused on finding this. We will also have to pay close attention to how the track is evolving with the grip over the weekend.”

Luca Marini – P22

“Speaking truthfully, I think our Friday was better than what the time sheets show today. I made a mistake during the time attack right at the end and there was a yellow flag so I wasn’t able to close a really strong lap. The positive is that the bike has improved and there is still more margin there. It’s time to work together, all Honda riders, and keep improving.”

Friday MotoGP Report

Aleix Espargaro was back on top at home with a new lap record but was closely followed by Brad Binder after the South African pulled off a great comeback after a troublesome start to the day.

It was actually a Red Bull KTM Factory Racing 1-2 for the majority of the session, but it wouldn’t stay like that by the end of play. Espargaro’s new lap record but paid to that, although Binder got close with one last bid for it. On his last flying lap, Binder got within 0.072 of the top to complete a recovery in style, having crashed once early on at Turn 2 and then again at the very same Turn 2 later in the session.

Pedro Acosta spent most of his day within the top 10 before a late push to reach that saw him claim third and earn his direct ticket for Q2.

Francesco Bagnaia was the fastest of the three riders at the top of the championship standings. The Italian set 23 laps across the session but had some drama after the flag came out, forced to push his bike back to the pit-lane. Still, Bagnaia was able to end the day ahead of the second Red Bull KTM Factory Racing machine of Jack Miller, who nevertheless completes the top five.

Jorge Martin managed to get the better of team-mate Franco Morbidelli, who had a solid day and made it both Prima Pramac Racing machines inside the top 10, split by just 0.038.

Enea Bastianini ends Friday in eighth after spending most of the session outside the top 15 positions but finding time in the closing minutes.

Alex Rins heads through to Q2 from P9 on Friday, his second visit this season so far and on the way to his 200th Grand Prix start.

Maverick Viñales rounded out the top 10.

Fabio Quartararo crashed at Turn 5 early on before ending the session in 14th.  There was plenty of other drama that went down too, with a number of crashes at the end of the session playing some havoc with yellow flags. Fabio Di Giannantonio (Pertamina Enduro VR46 Racing Team) crashed earlier at Turn 5, but things soon got worse for the Italian who then crashed for a second time at Turn 9 in the last 10 minutes of the session.

Alex Marquez (Gresini Racing MotoGP) also couldn’t improve after suffering a crash in the final five minutes, and with all that drama there was no space for many others to move forward either amongst the yellow flags. That included for his teammate Marc Marquez. The number #93 faces Q1 for the second time in two weeks, although in France it didn’t make too much difference… and he didn’t even make it through…

MotoGP Practice Times

MotoGP Free Practice One

MotoGP Speeds Across Both Practice Sessions

MotoGP Championship Standings

Moto2

Friday in Moto2 ended in some wildcard glory at the Gran Premi Monster Energy de Catalunya, with Jorge Navarro (KLINT Forward Factory Team) taking to the top and with a new lap record. Joe Roberts (OnlyFans American Racing) was second quickest, with replacement rider Daniel Muñoz (Pertamina Mandalika GAS UP Team) taking third fresh from doing the double at the venue in the Moto2 European Championship last weekend, where Navarro also stood on the podium.

After finishing fastest in Free Practice, Manuel Gonzalez (QJMOTOR Gresini Moto2) was fourth at the end of the day, setting a 1:43.076. Fermin Aldeguer (MB Conveyors SpeedUp) rounded out the top five in Moto2 but was unable to improve on his time late in the session, instead forced into a save. Aiming to take his second Moto2 victory will be Aron Canet (Fantic Racing), who was sixth – ending the day ahead of Elf Marc VDS Racing Team’s Filip Salač. The #12 was ahead of Sergio Garcia (MT Helmets – MSI) who showed consistent pace throughout the session despite a crash in the morning.

Senna Agius made a good start on Friday, the Australian finishing the day 13th quickest, 17 places ahead of much more experienced team-mate Darryn Binder.

Moto2 Practice One Times

Moto2 Free Practice Times

Moto2 Championship Standings

Moto3

David Alonso ends Friday at the top of the standings at the Gran Premi Monster Energy de Catalunya, fastest in the morning and afternoon. The CFMOTO Gaviota Aspar Team rider put in an impressive 12 lap run at the start of P1 and then stamped some authority back on the session on his final exit. He ends the day 0.158s clear of Jose Antonio Rueda (Red Bull KTM Ajo), with Daniel Holgado (Red Bull GASGAS Tech3) fnding a heap of time on Friday afternoon to end P1 in third.

It was a thrilling end to Friday with riders treating it like qualifying, as Holgado, Rueda, and then Alonso all switched the top spot between them with the pace beginning to heat up. However, Nicola Carraro (LEVELUP – MTA) crashed on his final lap, bringing out the yellow flag and taking away any chance for the #10 to improve. Another rider who had a bad end to Friday was Adrian Fernandez (Leopard Racing), who ended Friday at the bottom of the standings after suffering from a technical issue – unable to set a time.

Collin Veijer (Liqui Moly Husqvarna Intact GP) continued to impress, showing consistent pace to end the day a mere 0.255s adrift from the top spot. Ivan Ortola (MT Helmets – MSI) rounded out the top five, with the #48 putting in fast laps in the early stages of the session.

For Australian Jacob Roulstone, the Catalan GP was going to be a home race away from home, with the Moto3 rookie living just one hour away from the circuit. As he discovered the layout for the first time in the morning on his GASGAS, he closed the opening session of the weekend in 20th, just 0.098 seconds off his teammate. Later on, Roulstone was also one to significantly improve after he jumped up to eighth in the standing after Practice 1, with a best lap in 1’47.536.

Jacob Roulstone – P8

“I am quite happy with our first day here. In the morning, we did not rush things, we took the time to learn the layout with the bike, and made sure to work on the few things that needed to be worked on. The feeling was not the best at the start, but in the afternoon we were quite happy with the medium-medium tyres, the race pace was good, even when I was on my own. We still have some issues to fix, but overall, it was a very good day, and we have a lot of information to study ahead of qualifying day.”

For his countryman Joel Kelso, it was 14th on day one.

Moto3 Practice One Times

Moto3 Free Practice Times

Moto3 Championship Standings

MotoE Qualifying

The FIM Enel MotoE World Championship is back on track for Round 3 at the Gran Premi Monster Energy de Catalunya with two more blockbuster instalments awaiting us tomorrow. Launching from his tenth pole position in the electric class will be Eric Granado (LCR E-Team) after taking the spoils by setting a sensational 1:48.215. But it certainly wasn’t a comfortable pole position, as both Mattia Casadei (LCR E-Team) and Alessandro Zaccone (Tech3 E-Racing) set the exact same lap time just 0.032s behind Granado to line up second and third respectively.

For the first time in 2024, Nicholas Spinelli (Tech3 E-Racing) is not on the front row of the grid. The three-time winner this year – and sure championship contender – starts from fourth where he’ll have to watch out on his approach into Turn 1 so that rookie sensation Oscar Gutierrez (Axxis-MSI) and French GP polesitter Hector Garzo (Dynavolt Intact GP MotoE) don’t come flying down Spinelli’s inside from fifth and sixth. While Garzo won’t be overly pleased with sixth, there is at least a little more satisfaction in the #4’s side of the Dynavolt Intact GP MotoE™ garage than there is on Lukas Tulovic’s side, as unfortunately after Tulovic progressed through from Q1, he was unable to set a flying lap in Q2 due to technical issues.

On the third row is where we find yet more heavy MotoE hitters. Two-time World Cup Winner Jordi Torres (Openbank Aspar Team) lines up seventh for the second time this season just ahead of teammate Kevin Zannoni (Openbank Aspar Team) who fortunately this time was indeed able to take part in Q2 after progressing through Q1. Alongside them is the luckless Matteo Ferrari (Felo Gresini Team) who, after finding something of his old form in Practice, crashed late on in Q2 denying him the chance of being able to improve his grid slot. Regardless, ninth is his first top 10 start so far this season.

MotoE Combined Qualifying Times

MotoE Speed Across All Sessions

2024 FIM MotoGP World Championship calendar (Updated)

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