Maverick Viñales is fighting for top positions in the MotoGP Americas GP. The Aprilia rider was second in yesterday’s practice, just 0.076s behind leader Jorge Martín (Prima Pramac/Ducati).
The Spaniard made it clear that he was pleased with this Friday in Austin: ‘It was a good day, enjoying the bike, enjoying the track. This is a beautiful layout, it’s so nice when you feel good on this track that you can attack in the fast corners, changes of direction. I can say I enjoyed it a lot‘.
Despite the good laps yesterday, Viñales is convinced that there is room for improvement – even showing himself impressed with the already very low lap times:
– I can still improve, I’m not perfect. Sectors 3 and 4 are the main focus for Saturday. However, it will be a few tenths; on Friday we rode very fast – me and Martín. It’s amazing to go so low on Friday already. So I saw that I did 2m02.0s, almost falling and going off the track, and I said, “Well, maybe if I put it all together I can do a low 2m01s”. And I am very proud of the team’s work because this is not from here, it’s from Portimão. It’s good. I feel good with the bike, I feel the speed is there.
Regarding how he can improve in sectors 3 and 4, Viñales assured that it will not be with changes to the Aprilia RS-GP: ‘It’s just hard braking. With the medium rear [tire] I’m fine, but with the soft rear the engine brake still needs to improve a bit. Maybe also I attack a bit more, risk a bit more, but both will make a good combination. I think it’s more about that, because we won’t touch the bike; the bike is working well‘.
