THE APRILIA RIDERS WILL START FROM THE SECOND AND FOURTH ROW IN THE PHILLIP ISLAND RACE

It was an intense day at Phillip Island, with riders and teams busy both earning the best possible starting position and preparing for a race that promises to be a rather tactical one. The Aprilia riders achieved both objectives. 

Aleix will start from the first spot on the second row of the grid tomorrow and he has good sensations in race configuration. Maverick, the only rider in FP4 to drop below the 1'29 mark, despite a few doubts in terms of rear tyre choice, demonstrated great pace. In qualifying, he didn’t feel the increase in grip with the soft tyre that he needed in order to push to the limit, so he had to settle for a spot on the fourth row. The position doesn’t rule out any results, given the multiple opportunities for overtaking the Australian circuit offers.

ALEIX ESPARGARÓ
"I’m pleased. The RS-GP worked well in all conditions and I’m expecting a fun race. Maverick and I are working extremely well together. The slipstream in qualifying was definitely important. As I said yesterday, I expect this to be a race of management where conserving the tyre will be fundamental. It may seem easy to set a fast pace straight away, but it’s just as easy to lose half a second on the final laps. We’ll see. We’ll try whatever it takes to get the job done and starting from the second row is just fine."

MAVERICK VIÑALES
"In terms of pace, I’m extremely satisfied with the work we’ve done. I had never lapped this fast here at Phillip Island! I’m still undecided on tyre choice because I had good sensations with both the medium and the hard, so we’ll take the final decision after warm-up. It’s a pity about qualifying. I didn’t feel the extra grip with the soft tyre that I needed to be able to push but fortunately on this track there are several places where you can overtake, so I think I’ll be able to ride a good race."