Valencia Qualifying - Rider Quotes
- Nov 7, 2015
- 4 min read
The final qualifying session of the 2015 season concluded with an almighty lap from Jorge Lorenzo of 1:30.011 to take pole by a whopping half a-second and two tenths quicker than the existing pole record.
This has put the Spaniard, along with his long run pace, in the best possible position to clinch the World Championship tomorrow. Team-mate and rival Valentino Rossi starts from the back, and the shape of the grid is not favourable for him. A gaggle of fast Satellite bikes make up the second row, whilst the Factory Honda's of Pedrosa and Marquez just don't, at this stage, look good enough to beat Lorenzo.
A miracle, and or disaster, will be needed for Rossi to succeed. The rational amongst you know no such thing exists, but maybe the fact that MotoGP 2015 has thrown more plot twists than an M.Night Shamalan flick might make you reconsider nailing your flag to the mast just yet.
Lets have a look at what some of the riders had to say about their qualifying.
Jorge Lorenzo, Movistar Yamaha MotoGP – 1st:
“Today's goal was to qualify on first row, but there was a lot of tension. I expected that Andrea Iannone's bike with the soft tyre could steal the first row, so I put in the maximum effort at the track with the three tyres and that is what I did. I wasn't very satisfied with the first one, 1:30.9s wasn't the lap time I expected, but with the second one the bike worked perfectly with the grip, the braking, the corner speed and the acceleration. I rode better than on the previous lap and I got pole. It probably was my best lap in all my life and I'm very proud, but the important thing is to start from front row, make a good start tomorrow, don't make any mistakes and avoid problems on the first laps and try to get the World Title. Today they didn't give out points, the contest is tomorrow and it's going to be a difficult, long and stressful race.”
Valentino Rossi, Movistar Yamaha MotoGP - 12th (26th):
“I'm OK, this is the most important thing. The day was not so bad, especially in the morning I was strong, but in the afternoon I suffered a bit more with the grip and I struggled a little bit more with a higher temperature. After, in qualifying, we didn't have the pressure to try and set the best lap so we tried something else. Some modifications, but unfortunately after that I made a mistake and crashed, but this doesn't make a big difference for tomorrow because I will start last. We have to improve the grip to improve the race pace. If it's cool, lower degrees can change a lot of things about the grip in comparison between a Yamaha and a competing bike. Maybe, if the temperature is a little bit less, I can go a bit faster. It will be very hard, the bad news for the race is that Jorge rode to pole position, because we hoped he wouldn't start first, but fortunately we don't have to think about that, it's not our problem, I just have to recover as much as possible.”
Andrea Iannone, Ducati Team – 7th:
“For some aspects it was a positive day, with me setting quickest time in FP3, but then we didn't exactly do the best qualifying session of the season. In the afternoon we struggled quiet a lot and I was not able to improve my lap time. We're a bit off the pace of the quickest riders and now we have to improves something to try and do the race with the others tomorrow. For sure, we'll make every effort to do so.”
Aleix Espargaro, Suzuki Team Ecstar – 4th:
“I'm really happy, maybe more than in Catalunya when I made the pole position, because I had to go for the Q1 I had no more tyres for Q2, therefore for the time attack I went out with the hard tyre, which was the only new tyre I had. Incredibly, it performed better than the soft. It is good that I am in fourth place on the grid thanks to the same tyre I will use in the race and the same tyre that other top riders used. We have to proud of it; it is a good feeling. Here we had some troubles with the soft tyre, but we tried to persist, because normally when the temperatures goes up in the afternoon we always improve. This morning I felt very bad but I know that with the increasing temperature, it always gets better, but at the end the hard proved to be much more effective for our GSX-RR's configuration. Now I am very happy for the day and I feel confident for the race, we still have the chance to get into the top ten of the Championship and I would like to end the season with a positive race.”
Dani Pedrosa, Repsol Honda Team – 3rd:
“We'll see how it tomorrow goes and hope to be in the fight for the victory. Yesterday we had some problems but today we took a step forward and are in better shape. We'll have to start the race very focused and I'm looking forward to racing at this track, in front of the home fans. I'll push 100% because it is sure to be a hotly contested race; Marc and Jorge have a strong pace so let's hope for a good race!”
Marc Marquez, Repsol Honda Team – 2nd:
“It's all very close on the time sheets with regards to race pace and I think it will be a tough race tomorrow; there is not much between us. We need to see what happens with the tyres and how the bike responds after ten consecutive laps. We are on a par with Dani and Jorge and I will try to get on the podium and hope to fight for victory at this last race of 2015.”
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