Cal Crutchlow is back to racing weekends in MotoGP. The British rider finished the first day in 16th position, just behind his teammate Franco Morbidelli.
The rider spoke about the feeling of being back racing in MotoGP and was positive about the team’s work and his performance.
– ‘The fucking neck is hurting, I can tell you that! But the way of riding is so different, it’s been so long since Malaysia and this time there were more bikes on the track. I had one bike in front and it felt like there were six or seven, I had to concentrate on everything that was going on and it was too much for me at first, but today went well, I’m happy with the team, they were very good at changing the tires, they were quick and it was good to see them working.
Cal Crutchlow also spoke about how the bike has evolved since he rode it in Malaysia and explained what he feels to be better or worse.
– ‘ It’s not the normal bike, there were a lot of parts on the bike that I said I didn’t want, like the wings are different to the other Yamaha riders, it’s a completely different bike and it’s another step we want to take. It doesn’t matter what the result is, we need more data, but at the moment the bike is very difficult to ride, with a lot of downforce and heavy when changing direction, despite having more acceleration now it’s still very unbalanced, probably because of the wings and the front is very low. We have to test more and that’s what we’re doing here, I was happy with how the day went, I was faster here than I’ve been in years. If I had more testing time and more time on the bike, I could do a good lap, but it’s still very difficult with this bike and it will be next year. The problem with the exhaust at the moment is that we can’t hear anything, Fabio (Quartararo) used the new exhaust and took it off after three laps because we can’t hear anything, it sounds like an electric bike’.