The strong wind and the lack of grip affected the first day of free practices of the Catalunya Grand Prix, which is held this weekend at the Montmeló Circuit, in Spain.
After having finished FP1 with the second-fastest time in 1:40.861, Andrea Dovizioso returned to the track this afternoon aiming to understand the bike behaviour with used tyres ahead of Sunday’s race. Therefore, the rider from Forlì couldn’t improve his morning performance ending the day in 15th place and intending to access directly in Q2 by trying his time attack in FP3 tomorrow morning.
Danilo Petrucci will also take to the track tomorrow with the same target, after having finished two challenging sessions today with the 22nd time overall in 1:42.059. As he struggled with today’s weather conditions, the rider from Umbria managed to find towards the end of the day more positive feedback on his bike, which make him confident ahead of tomorrow’s qualifying.
Andrea Dovizioso (#04 Ducati Team) – 1:40.861 (15th)
“As expected, there is much less grip on this track than Misano, and for this reason, in this morning’s session, we first had to adapt to these new conditions. Compared to the rest of the riders on track, today we worked very differently and therefore we cannot make a real comparison to understand our potential. Unfortunately, with today’s strong wind we have not been able to get any univocal feedback from the tests we made, so we hope tomorrow to find different conditions, which will allow us to confirm the work done. The goal will be to be able to finish FP3 in the top ten tomorrow morning”.
Danilo Petrucci (#9 Ducati Team) – 1:42.059 (22nd)
“It was a rather difficult day, conditioned mainly by the strong wind, which prevented us from immediately understanding which direction to take on this track. After the first session, we made choices that were not correct, and that’s why we had to take a step back. Fortunately, we were able to find the right way towards the end of the day and understand what we need. Of course, today we did not try a time attack, but after this afternoon, I am confident that I can improve tomorrow”.
The Ducati Team riders will be back on track tomorrow starting at 9:55 AM local time (GMT +2.00) for FP3 while qualifying for the Catalunya GP will be held beginning from 2:10 PM, after FP4.
