Brad heads up seventh row of Mugello grid

Brad Binder will head the seventh row of the grid in tomorrow’s Italian GP at Mugello after setting his best time of the weekend in Qualifying.

The last Moto2 Free Practice was a different experience for each of the two Red Bull KTM Ajo riders. Brad made one stop to fit new tyres, although his best lap was set in the early stages. A 1:52.718 was almost half a second faster than his best time from yesterday and placed him fourteenth. Teammate Oliveira ended the session in eighteenth position with a 1:52.741, making two pit stops and focusing his work on riding with used tyres and looking for race pace.

Both riders reserved several compounds of new tyres for qualifying, but the pair made a change to their usual strategy and set their best laps on their first stints. A 1:52.145 gave Oliveira eleventh place, whilst Brad was nineteenth with a 1:52.433. The high level of competition was once again shown, as the first 19 riders were separated by just a single second.

Starting from 12:20pm, Brad will look to improve upon his tenth position from last year’s Italian GP.

BRAD BINDER
“We have found something that seems to work better, but it’s unbalanced the bike in other aspects, so the position is still not good. We couldn’t set a good time, so this is the result we have at the moment. It’s clear that there is something that we are missing, but the only thing we can do now is continue working hard and try to find something new that will help us.
It is important to stay focused and continue to strive as before to find something that makes us feel more comfortable. Tomorrow I will give my all; I will try to make a good start to get overtaking as soon as possible. Last year I took off from 24th and finished 10th, so I hope I can do the same tomorrow.”