Big improvements for Joan Mir saw the #36 narrowly miss out on the top ten in Argentina, Saturday set to be a day of comebacks for the double World Champion.
It was a lone Joan Mir left to face the changeable conditions of the two Friday practice sessions inside the Repsol Honda Team garage as Marc Marquez continued his recovery at home in Spain. Morning showers threatened a wet start to the day for the MotoGP field at the 4.8-kilometer long Termas de Rio Hondo circuit, but the track dried quickly. Rain would threaten most of the day, but it would ultimately remain dry.
Mir avoided fitting a soft rear slick and pushing for a fast lap in the morning session as he worked on improving the feeling of his Honda RC213V in Argentina. Down the timesheets, Mir and the Repsol Honda Team worked solidly throughout the lunch break to find solutions to the situation for the crucial afternoon session. Improving to a best time of 1’39.257, almost 1.5 seconds faster than his FP1 time, Mir ended the day in 13th. 0.120s shy of a spot in the combined top ten, the #36 was left disappointed with the day and is already plotting his comeback on Saturday.
Saturday will see the second MotoGP Sprint race take place; 12 laps of all-out action scheduled to start at 15:00 Local Time.
Joan Mir
13TH 1’39.257
“It was a pretty tough day. We started with a base setting which was not the best for this track, and we spent a lot of time working on it to improve. There is clearly a lot of potential there with the bike, Taka and Rins were strong, but I am just missing the final few tenths. We made a lot of progress and finally our pace at the end, especially with used tyres, was quite close to the top five. We just need more time now to work on the fine details, it’s still just our second race so this is part of the process. Even like this we were able to make some big improvements today and we aim to continue it tomorrow.”
- From Repsol Honda Team
