DNF for Brad in Le Mans Sprint Race

MotoGP continued to stage a show in front of a large, loud and appreciative trackside audience with round six of the series rounding the historic curves of the Le Mans Bugatti circuit. After a capacity event at Jerez in Spain two weeks ago, the French Grand Prix introduced another fence-busting date to the schedule. Brad Binder had to enter Q1 but had promising speed for the layout that mixes hard-braking and accelerating points with several fast sections like Dunlop Curve, La Chapelle and Le Musee.

Brad almost emerged from the Q1 dash on Saturday morning. He was within one hundredth of a second from slotting three KTM RC16s into Q2. The South African ended qualifying in 13th and five positions in front of Bastianini who ranked 18th: a repeat of their grid berths from Jerez.

In the Sprint race itself, Brad made a great start and was involved with battling Pedro Acosta until he sadly crashed on lap four entering Chemin Aus Boeufes.

The French Grand Prix starts at the regular CET time of 14.00 on Sunday and will tear-up Le Mans for 27 laps.

Brad Binder
13th in qualification, DNF in the Sprint:

“Honestly, today wasn’t too bad. Apart from just missing out on Q2 and flicking myself out of the race my feeling on the bike is pretty good, and I can push. It was a very weird crash and unfortunate because I felt good up until that point and ready for the fight. I had the potential to go with Maverick and Pedro and we’ll have another try tomorrow. I’m confident we can do a good job: my bike is a rocket off the line.”