Enea Bastianini continues to climb the podium, but he still lacks the push to attack the victory. This time the Ducati rider managed to do a good qualifying in the second MotoGP race at Misano, completing the front row, even if the gap of half a second gained by poleman Pecco Bagnaia did not seem to leave him with too many hopes for the Sprint.
In reality, “Beast” managed to stay quite close to his teammate and Jorge Martin. In fact, towards the end he even gave the impression that he could get closer. Only to then throw in the towel, fearing he would have to serve a penalty for a track limit that he hadn’t actually committed.
“I’m half happy, because I was hoping to stay there, but after I got the track limits warning I did another lap where I thought I was out again and I was convinced I was going to get a long lap penalty, but instead I was in. In the end it was a good race, but recovering a tenth or two when you’re lapping in the low 1’31” is very difficult,” Bastianini said when he met with journalists at the end of the day.
When asked if today’s race could be useful to try to do something more than third place, he continued: “We simply went back a bit to yesterday’s bike, because this morning I didn’t feel comfortable with a different bike, so it took me a while to get back into the rhythm, but already from qualifying I knew I could stay more or less there with them. Then I definitely saw a few things for tomorrow and I think we can work quite a bit with the electronics.”
In the early stages of the race he also pulled off a great overtaking move on Brad Binder at Quercia, which allowed him not to lose too much time behind the KTM rider: “The attack on Binder came by force of circumstances, in the sense that when you have him in front of you you never know what can happen. So, it’s better to try to pass him straight away, otherwise you risk being behind him for even five or six laps. The slightly cooler weather also helps, because we definitely lock the front a little less and you can overtake a little better”, he said, underlining that this weekend overtaking seems easier than in the race two weeks ago, when the very high temperatures had complicated the management of the front tire pressure.
Francesco Bagnaia, Ducati Team, Enea Bastianini, Ducati Team
Photo credit: Gold and Goose / Motorsport Images
Now it’s time to turn the page and think about tomorrow’s long race, in which he will switch to the medium rear tyre, with which he has an interlocutory relationship: “Tomorrow with the medium it will be a different race. In the tests I used it very well, while at the start of the weekend less so. I hope that the grip and temperature will be more in line with those of last Monday, but usually in the last laps I am quite fast. And I don’t think the soft will be an option for the race”.
His words therefore suggest that he is more hopeful of being able to try to win tomorrow: “I hope so, but I know that we can only do it if we do things perfectly. Otherwise it is difficult, because it seems that Pecco has something more at the moment. Martin has it, but the peak always comes in the first laps, but we will have to see tomorrow, because we must never underestimate anyone”.
But Enea certainly has clear ideas about what he already does well and what he needs to improve: “Entering corners is always a bit of my strong point. When I’m in good shape I can always do T1 and T2 very well. The most critical ones are T3, but maybe not too much, and especially T4. I lose a lot at the exit of turn 14 and with the electronics we haven’t yet found the right balance to make the difference. Let’s hope we can find it for tomorrow”.
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