Top 10 for Bendsneyder in qualifying

With an excellent qualification Bo Bendsneyder secured a place in the top 10 for the GP of Teruel. His NTS RW Racing GP teammate Piotr Biesiekirski starts from thirtieth place. The Moto2 race at Motorland Aragon starts at 14.30 CET (winter time). Saturday went well for NTS RW Racing GP in every aspect. In FP3, Bendsneyder at one point seemed te be on his way to provisional pole position, but in the last sector of the circuit he lost three tenths. His time of 1.53.256 was eventually good for the twelfth fastest time in the session. That was just not enough for the top 14 of the combined standings and so Bendsneyder had to secure a place in the second qualifying round through Q1. He succeeded with flying colors. To stay out of traffic, Bendsneyder waited a while at the start of Q1. The first flying lap was already good for third. With his next lap, of 1.51.933, he left the entire field, including Marini, Schrotter, Manzi, Vierge and Luthi, way behind.
Also in Q2 Bendsneyder waited for a while until everybody else was on the track. Again he managed to ride a lap under 1.52. With the 1.51.946 he then set, he finished tenth for the starting grid for tomorrow’s Moto2 race. “An excellent performance,” said NTS RW Racing GP team manager Jarno Janssen. “It went quite well last week and again this weekend Bo is doing well. He shows again that both he and the material are good enough for the top 10.” Piotr Biesiekirski continued yesterday’s progression and continued to improve his times. In FP3 he already came below 1.55, with 1.54.917. In qualifying he once again took over half a second off: 1.54.398.

Bo Bendsneyder: “The plan was to let the fast guys do a lap in Q1 and then go after them. That didn’t quite work out, but it immediately turned out that I could do a fast lap on my own and that I could do that a few times in a row. We know that I am a lot faster in the last sector with a slipstream, but it has to be just right. I tried again in Q2, but again it didn’t work. In the first lap my tires were not yet warm enough and when I got to the group in the next lap, they closed the gas. So I set my lap time on my own again. It’s a pity that I couldn’t use the slipstream, because that costs top speed, but it’s very positive that I can make up for that in the other parts of the lap and that the top speed is already much better than last year. I am very happy with this result. It’s a good starting position. Hopefully I can finish it in the race tomorrow, because that’s what it’s all about.”

Results Q1 & Q2 combined:

Source: rwracinggp.com, motogp.com