Preparations for Sunday’s Czech Republic GP, the twelfth round of this season’s MotoGP championship, continued at the Brno circuit today, culminating in this afternoon’s qualifying session to determine the grid for tomorrow’s race. It will not be an easy race for the Pramac d’Antin team with both riders looking to make up positions after a difficult qualifying session. Brazilian Alex Barros, who will start from the fifth row, is determined to make a good start immediately to find competitive race pace. He will aim to recover positions in order to fight in the top eight.
Ivan Silva will face an even tougher race, the Spaniard riding the GP7 for only the third time, but he will give his best to obtain a positive result tomorrow afternoon.
Alex Barros (1’58.204 – 20 laps): ”The adjustments we made this morning and the different kinds of tyre we chose enabled us to improve in comparison with yesterday’s practice; unfortunately the problem is always the same, I’m not fast enough with qualifying tyres. I don’t know why, but we are always missing the first rows on the grid. This means that also tomorrow I will have to be concentrated on making a good start and to get immediately on the pace. Fortunately, as regards race setting, I’m confident because this afternoon I could ride in the low 1.59s bracket, improving my pace by eight-tenths in comparison with free practice in the morning. Furthermore, this circuit is long and it is not too problematic to overtake usually. Of course this is what I will try to do tomorrow. I want to be fast and overtake from the first laps to ride with the leading group.”
Ivan Silva (1’59.721 – 16 laps): ”Unfortunately, because of some technical difficulties, we couldn’t utilize qualifying tyres as we would have liked. I’m very displeased because I haven’t improved my position. My biggest regret is for the team who decided to give me the opportunity to run in MotoGP again and the crew who have worked very well this weekend. Tomorrow I hope to do a good start and to succeed in riding with the small group of riders in front of me that have the same race pace and to overtake some of them.”
Official Times:
1. Casey Stoner: 1’56.884
2. Nicky Hayden: 1’57.164
3. Dani Pedrosa: 1’57.179
4. John Hopkins: 1’57.567
5. Randy De Puniet: 1’57.599
13. Alex Barros: 1’58.204
18. Ivan Silva: 1’59.721
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