Unlike the factory KTMs, the GasGas Factory Racing Tech3 team has not had an easy time at the Thai GP. Still, Augusto Fernandez, the only rookie in the premier class this year, managed to qualify 12th but failed to finish the Sprint race.
In a debrief, the spanish rider said that although he wasn’t feeling bad about the pace of the Sprint, he was a little on the limit when he crashed:
– A pity the fall. I’m disappointed by the crash, the weekend was going well. Yesterday I struggled a bit with the pace and as soon as the tyres dropped, I wasn’t riding comfortable, the conditions on the front tyre maybe didn’t help because of the group and the high temperatures, but I was a bit on the limit and when I passed Pol (Espargaro) I saw an opening for (Joan) Mir and I tried. I wasn’t feeling too bad, but I lost the front without any warning. I need to work a little bit at this pace for tomorrow because it’s going to be worse, the race is longer and the tyres are going to be more complicated to manage, so we’ll see.
Fernandez also said that he will look at Brad Binder’s data in order to understand what he can improve tomorrow, stating that whatever the tyre choice is, it will be at least bad:
– What Brad is doing is very good, so let’s see if we can copy something tomorrow. It’s mean to anyone. We have to listen to what our tyre technique says and trust it, because the feeling is very similar. (…) It will only be to choose the least bad.