The Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP teammates were unable to make up ground like they wanted to in the mixed conditions of today’s Grand Prix of Japan Sprint. Fabio Quartararo and Álex Rins finished the 12-lap dash in P12 and P16 respectively.
Quartararo started from P12 and found himself in the busy mid-pack in the opening corners. He settled in 15th place after lap 1, but Brad Binder returned to the pits a few laps in due to a mechanical problem, so the Frenchman was soon back in 14th position. He had a significant gap to the riders ahead and behind him, though, so making progress was a challenge. Two further crashes from rivals saw him riding in 12th place as he crossed the finish line 14.645s from first.
Rins started the Sprint from P19 but struggled to defend his position and fell back to 21st place. However, he gained several positions over the course of the 12 laps due to the misfortune of other riders. Meanwhile, the Spaniard gritted his teeth and upped his pace. He overtook Lorenzo Savadori with five laps to go and ended the Sprint in 16th place, 24.415s from the winner.
Today’s results see Quartararo hold 13th place in the overall standings with 82 points. Rins remains in joint-19th position with 20 points. Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP keep their 9th place in the team championship with 102 points, and Yamaha hold on to 4th position in the constructor’s championship with 93 points.
The team will be back in action tomorrow for Warm Up, held from 09:40 – 09:50 GMT +9, and the 24-lap Race, which starts at 14:00.
Massimo Meregalli
Team Director
Overall, it was a difficult day, with the only highlight being that Fabio was able to go from Q1 to Q2 with a perfect lap. Unfortunately, our performance today reflected and confirmed what we had already found between yesterday’s Practice and today’s FP2. We used today’s Sprint to try some things to improve the bike, and we will now analyse the data, and, if required, tomorrow we will tweak the settings and race with another configuration.
Fabio Quartararo
Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP Rider
It was a difficult Sprint. The track conditions affect our results. If there’s grip, we’re okay, if there’s no grip, we are far from the front. It was raining a little bit, and these conditions are difficult for us. We have to take this experience on board and see if there’s something we can improve. But it’s not a matter of the set-up, it’s more a matter of rear grip.
Álex Rins
Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP Rider
We tried a big change on the bike, something different from the Quali to the Sprint race because the step that we made between Friday afternoon and FP2 on Saturday morning was very small, and I couldn’t feel the improvement. So, we took the risk of doing something bolder for the Sprint race, and we found something. We’re still super far from the front, but the engineers are analysing the data because the rear contact with the track did improve a little.
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