Gresini’s Enea Bastianini was back challenging the reigning MotoGP Champion at Jerez on Friday after securing second in the overall standings.
Banishing the demons of Portimao’s lap ten crash last time out, Bastianini’s 1’37.272 effort at the Andalusian track headed a trio of Ducati Desmosedici’s in the top five with Pecco Bagnaia just 0.01s behind. Fabio Quartararo circulating two-tenths out front on the Yamaha M1 as the Spanish GP preparations got firmly underway.
“I'm happy about the result,” Bastianini confirmed on Friday evening, having spent the morning outside of the top ten. “Not too much for the feeling with my bike today.
"The feeling is surely great on the time attack, while we still have to improve race-pace wise. It stays really hard to be fast especially with the medium tyre. With the soft we have made a really good step but for tomorrow we have to work more in this area, because it's important for me to be fast on the pace.
“My pace is not really nice, but we did a good step during FP2 to adapt the bike at my style. Now I'm more positive for tomorrow.”
When asked what he was struggling with the Italian replied: “Grip on the maximum angle, anytime I bring the throttle, I lose the rear and this is a problem. I've not my brilliant feeling on the front, inside the corner we have to work a little bit but also the grip of the track was not really nice, was not in the best of conditions as there was still water coming up at turn five, and especially at turns two and eight.”
