After putting the finishing touch on Saturday, Aleix Espargaró can boast of having broken the track record twice, having led almost all the sessions and having snatched pole, by 31 thousandths, from Pecco Bagnaia.
The rider from Granollers is at home, on a track with increasingly high temperatures that will truncate the course of the tires in the MotoGP paddock.
“It’s not been easy at all. It’s a very difficult track, I like it a lot, but because of the type of grip there is, it’s costing me the same as everyone else,” the Spanish rider introduced after finishing Saturday. “It is difficult to know how to extract the maximum of the tire without destroying it. It is very difficult to achieve that fine line.”
Circuit de Barcelona – Catalunya is one of the tracks with the lowest grip in the championship. For this reason, Aleix Espargaró used the slipstream of his Aprilia teammate, Maverick Viñales, to get the most out of his RS-GP.
“The problem is not going fast, the difficult thing is going fast without destroying the tire. In the time trial I knew I had options, but it will be very easy to make a mistake, today the direction was closed all the time. I was able to take the I slipstream Maverick [Viñales] and he has helped me a lot, so I want to thank him.”
These premises invite us to think that the race could be a matter of three: Aleix Espargaró, Pecco Bagnaia and Fabio Quartararo.
“I think [we] have been the fastest, but when the grip is this low, anything can happen. Last year he won a KTM here, so it’s not going to do just being fast. It will be difficult to maintain the tire until the end”, admitted the Catalan.
“Yes, I think we are the fastest a priori, but tomorrow there will be a good show.”
“In Argentina I had the feeling that I had more margin with the others and it didn’t cost me much to do the time. Here I go very to the limit and Argentina was an ideal world, but that doesn’t exist, so we’ll see if it happens again this year” .
“It is an honor and a responsibility to be the first Spanish driver in this grand prix and in the classification, it is all very rare and I accept that responsibility with great pride and I am going to try to do everything to win”, settled Espargaró.
