SBK | Petrucci: “I ride alert, I don’t feel safe on the bike”

Seeing Danilo Petrucci on the circuit and seeing him wearing a leathers and helmet to get on his Ducati and take part in Friday’s free practice for the Misano round is perhaps one of the best news of the weekend in Romagna. The Barni team rider has in fact returned after a bad injury in motocross training which seriously put his career at risk. “I wasn’t sure I could tell it,” Petrux said of the incident.

Instead, not only did he tell it, but he also fought against the pain, taking to the track today for the two free practice sessions, which he ended with the 15th fastest time in the combined standings (14th in FP1 and 12th in FP2). In terms of times, the rider from Terni can be considered quite satisfied if he thinks about the physical difficulties. However, Petrux’s real problem is his approach to the track, which is more cautious and less instinctive.

“I’m happy to be here, it’s hard to imagine the feeling you have when there’s so much pain”, begins Petrucci speaking to the media, including Motorsport.com. “I thought I would suffer less, this morning it wasn’t too bad, but lap after lap it became very difficult to brake. When you feel pain you also get a headache, so I feel so tired.”

He was visibly tired at the end of Friday’s free practice, but not just physically. The mind is important and the feelings of insecurity on the Ducati are anything but positive: “Even if the feeling with the bike isn’t that bad, I don’t feel safe with the bike. Not because I’m missing something, but I feel pain at every turn and I’m always on alert, so I’m more rigid on the bike.”

The Terni native confides that he isn’t even so sure he’ll be able to play the entire round: “It’s only the first day. I don’t know if I’ll be able to complete the weekend, I’ll try to do the races tomorrow. There is great inflammation on the right shoulder, the more it is stressed the worse it gets. The fractures have all been fixed, the problem in driving is only the shoulder. This morning I didn’t take painkillers, as I pushed harder and harder I felt a lot of pain.”

“This afternoon I only did the last quarter of an hour. I didn’t even do badly, but I ride with a state of alert and I don’t feel safe on the bike. I know I can’t fall, but I can’t even turn two seconds slower, otherwise there’s no point. It’s a situation where whatever you do, you screw up. Staying at home perhaps made more sense, but I couldn’t remain with the doubt of not having tried”, confesses Petrux.

Despite his fears, the pilot’s spirit does not go away and, when asked if perhaps it would not have been better to wait a little longer, he smiles and states that the desire to test himself was too strong, despite knowing the difficulties: “I don’t it’s easy to take it easy, because when you go and you feel good, you want to try. But then he starts to feel the pain curve after curve and it’s not nice. If I were to tell the truth, yesterday morning and this morning too, I felt good. The more I try, the more I get into trouble, let’s say.”

“Let’s see how I wake up tomorrow. If I feel worse, I can think about stopping, but if I feel good I’ll at least try to do the Superpole and go to the race. But I don’t want to make the situation worse, I want to be fit for Donington. This weekend is just a test to understand what the situation is like. If you don’t get out there and try, you can’t know. It was important for us to try, at least today. No need to take risks? It’s true, but if I’m here I want to run. Why not give it a try? I feel very bad right now,” she concludes.