If Marc Marquez, Andrea Dovizioso and Bradley Smith were heroic riding with their new injuries, Cal Crutchlow once again proved how tough he is.
The Yamaha Tech3 rider crashed out Q2 because he was ‘unsighted’ as he touched the kerb at turn 3.
The British rider has been suffering from hayfever all weekend and his eyes are watering, but his misfortune turned into a fourth spot because his spare bike was better than his first and offering more front end feeling, but he admits that he still has to improve the first sector.
Check out what the rest of the riders had to say after today’s exciting qualifying session at Mugello.
Cal Crutchlow – 4th “That was certainly another eventful qualifying session and after crashing out I can’t complain too much to finish fourth and be only 0.
004s away from the front row.
Luckily I could make it back to the paddock pretty quickly and get out on the second bike and to be on the second row is a good result given what happened.
I have been struggling all weekend with the bike to be honest.
And although this is my third year at this track, I still don’t feel so comfortable, so to be near the front and not running a bad pace gives me confidence for the race.
I need to improve in the first sector and that was my biggest issue yesterday, so we have work to do.
It is going to be a long and tough race and we need to make the bike work better.
My Monster Yamaha Tech 3 Team is doing an awesome job to help me find the best setting and hopefully I can be fighting for the podium again tomorrow like I was in Le Mans.
” Stefan Bradl – 5th“Actually this P5 is very important for us and I am pleased with the improvement we achieved.
All the Honda riders have a better pace thanks to the better temperature of the asphalt.
The qualifying was a bit tough for us as we have been waiting till the last moment to get the best lap time.
I am looking forward to the race tomorrow because we have the potential to take the first podium and I am sure it will be an exciting race with the guys in the front”.
Alvaro Bautista – 9th“I am not particularly happy with our position on the grid for tomorrow.
I felt I could do a better lap than that because we have improved my confidence with the bike compared to yesterday but we didn’t manage it.
My race pace is good and hopefully if we can get a good start we can stick with the lead group and fight for a top five position at the end.
”Bradley Smith – 11th “First of all I was just happy that I was able to ride today after the big crash in practice yesterday.
My left hand is not in the best condition but the Clinica Mobile staff did an incredible job working on my finger and my wrist.
Sometimes there were four people working on me at the same time, so I owe a huge thanks to all of them for helping me to be out on track today.
Considering this whole situation I really have to be happy to have made my way to QP2, even if 11th is a little bit disappointing.
But I preferred to save my energy for tomorrow’s race, which will probably be very demanding from a physical point of view, instead of risking too much for a better lap time this afternoon.
I’m also very pleased with the set-up of the bike and we just need to make a couple of small changes for the warm up, but all things considered we should be proud of what we achieved given my physical condition.
Now I will just try to get as much rest as possible for tomorrow as I want to collect a decent number of points for the Championship and hopefully battle for another top 10.
” Aleix Espargaró – 12th “I’m very pleased with how it’s going here at Mugello.
I love this track but it’s challenging for the CRT riders especially.
Our team, Aprilia and I are squeezing out whatever advantage we can every day and that’s putting us close to the prototypes.
Every race we’re trying something new and it’s working so well, so we keep moving forward.
Tomorrow we’ll try to keep that going.
The race will be tough, they are many laps and the concentration levels required are very high.
I hope the temperaturas don’t keep increasing.
I have a good race pace, so I need to make a good start and stick to the group in front of me”.
Andrea Iannone – 13th“I had quite a hard time today and I definitely thought I’d be faster on this track with all the information.
However, we have a different rear tyre now, and the motorcycle and the electronics are also a bit different, but perhaps it isn’t just that.
Dovizioso rode really fast, so I think there’s some margin for me to do better if we could just understand where we need to make changes.
I tried a different setting that I’ll reconsider tomorrow during the warm-up because I wasn’t able to do the pace that I wanted.
In any case, from now until tomorrow there’s still time to understand what and where we can improve, what I may be doing wrong, and how much instead depends on the bike.
Physically I’m fine, the only thing is I might be short of breath because since the fall in Jerez I could only resume training last week.
Tomorrow I’d like to regain the 3 – 4 tenths I need, and I’m going to do my best to get off to a good start and have a good race.
Randy de Puniet – 14th“We had a big crash on the last lap of free practice and it meant we lost a lot of preparation time.
I’m not totally sure why it happened but a lack of grip was definitely one factor.
Fortunately we found a solution in order to increase balance on the chicanes.
Q1 was decent for us and we were able to respond after the crash.
The consistency is there and we’re not far off the pace so I’m motivated for the race.
I wanted to make Q2 but we’re doing a good job and I want to thank the crew for fixing the bike so quickly.
My feeling on the bike really improved after the crash and I’m confident that tomorrow a good result is possible”.
Colin Edwards – 16th“We found a pretty good setting yesterday, played around a little bit with it, mainly messed with the electronics to see if we could get it better.
In qualifying I got behind Smith and put my head down.
I can’t say I’m happy but I gave it all I’ve got, I think we are lacking a little bit of traction, exit grip.
We might try something tomorrow morning if it’s dry.
”Claudio Corti – 17th“Since yesterday we have made important modifications on the front of the bike that have turned out to be very beneficial since in the afternoon session I was able to improved a lot my lap times.
We are working in the right direction; I have a better feeling with the bike, we have also improved a lot in terms of the electronics.
We made some modifications that Colin (Edwards) had suggested and the electronics are now working better.
We have some ideas for tomorrow’s warm up in the hope that they will be useful too.
The pace is good, we have the motivation, we have the fans behind, its our home race and if tomorrow morning we managed to get a two or three tenths we can hope to do well.
”Karel Abraham – 20th“Of course I’m not satisfied, I hoped, that we could be around fifteen position.
I’m angry because this position wasn’t so far and we could make it.
On Friday I was riding only half of second slowly respected today and this is very small improvement.
We would need improvement of another half of second to reach good result.
During qualifying practice we were using the bike on which I will start to the tomorrow’s race.
Unfortunately we were struggling with problems on this bike all the day.
I hope that we find all problems and tomorrow the bike will be prepared.
I’m still struggling with health issues so before practices I had to take drip in medical centre.
But I don’t admit that it could limit me during tomorrow’s race.
Bryan Staring – 22nd“This is proving to be a difficult weekend for me.
I am struggling to get a feel for the track and the crash this morning made things even more difficult.
We made some improvements this afternoon but the gap to the guys in front is still too big.
Despite everything I am still confidence for the race because I think if we can make a good start and follow some guys who know the track well I can get a better reference.
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