The MotoGP riders entered the track for their Warm-Up with a strong wind and many threatening clouds at the Circuit of the Americas in Austin. Conditions that have led them to make tire choices that we will hardly see again when in Italy it is 8 pm and the race starts.
All of them, in fact, worked in the 20 minutes available with the soft tire on the front, while the primary option should be the hard one. At the rear, on the other hand, almost all have mounted the soft, with the exception of Johann Zarco and Raul Fernandez, who crashed at turn 12 in the final, who tried to experiment with the average, which could be the alternative.
Only seven riders managed to break the wall of 2’04 “and it must be said that compared to qualifying the Aprilia seem to have made an important step forward: after staying out of Q2, Maverick Vinales was the fastest, stopping the stopwatch on 2’03 “647.
At the pace level, the feeling continues to be, however, that probably one of the best equipped for the race is Enea Bastianini, second with the Ducati of Gresini Racing 109 thousandths from the top. Not bad, however, also the performance of Pecco Bagnaia, fourth at 206 thousandths, also behind the Honda of Takaaki Nakagami.
The Aprilia step forward is confirmed by Aleix Espargaro’s fifth fastest time, 294 thousandths behind his boxmate. In the top 10 there is also room for the two Suzuki, with Joan Mir occupying sixth place and Alex Rins who is ninth instead.
Between the two GSX-RRs there are Zarco, who closed the rear average experiment with a gap of 362 thousandths, and a Marc Marquez who struggles to regain confidence with his RC213V and also in this Warm-Up has limited to completing just 6 rounds.
Instead, we have to go down to tenth place to find the reigning world champion Fabio Quartararo, who pays just over half a second with his Yamaha. It went worse for his partner Franco Morbidelli, who completed just two laps before his M1 was hit by a technical problem and found himself last.
Poleman Jorge Martin 11th, but also Jack Miller, who will join him in the front row, did not go beyond the 14th time trial. As for the other Italians: Marco Bezzecchi occupies the 13th position, Luca Marini the 17th, while Andrea Dovizioso and Fabio Di Giannantonio travel in tandem in the 20th and 19th.
The KTMs do not seem to have solved their problems, because the best of the RC16s is only in 15th position with Brad Binder and Miguel Oliveira is even 22nd.
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