Top 10 just three-tenths apart - Jack Miller and Brad Binder explain why
“It’s a short track,” Brad Binder pondered. “1m 29s…”
Jack Miller interrupted: “With two massive straights…”
Binder: “Yeah. F****** hell! 30s on the straights, maybe, so you don’t have that much space to make a difference.
“It’s super-tight over one lap but, in the race, it will be normal.”
Miller explained more about why the field was so close on Friday: “It’s relatively simple - the track, the layout.
“It’s hard to make up time, it’s hard to lose time.
“You can only brake as late as possible at Turn 1 and Turn 3. It’s a balance, on both of those corners.
“The infield is tight. On the last sector - 9, 10, 11, that sequence of corners - I am losing a bit of time there.
“It’s not that difficult a track but, when you’re trying to find thousandths here and there, that’s when it gets hard.”
Binder: “We have a little bit in our pocket that we can try to fix"
Binder went ninth-fastest in the session topped by title-chasing Jorge Martin.
The KTM rider reacted: “Today wasn’t too bad. This morning things were tricky.
“For the afternoon we made a good step forward. I was surprised to get through to Q2 but I didn’t do a lap in the last run, I had two yellow flags and went off-track. Not ideal.
“Glad to have scraped through. I feel like we’ve got good potential tomorrow.
“We have a little bit in our pocket that we can try to fix, some small things in the bike. If I can improve Sector 3, I can make a good step.”
Binder was quickest in the first and last sectors at Buriram.
“I feel good for braking and entry,” he said. “The places that we need to flow are a little sketchy - that’s Sector 3, pretty much. Sector 2, I’m not perfect either. We have an idea how to make those better for tomorrow.”
Miller: “Apparently he wasn’t on the line. But, I mean..."
Miller was frustratingly restricted to 13th.
He explained: “This morning was good, felt good. This afternoon was not good, I did 20 laps on a tyre which didn’t work at all.
“I put a hard tyre on afterwards and immediately went one second faster.
“The first time-attack was good, back to normal, I was pretty happy. The second time-attack I had Aleix on the line, going into Turn 4 the fastest corner on the track.
“Apparently he wasn’t on the line. But, I mean, there’s only one line there…
“Second lap, yellow flag. 0.3s off, 13th, that’s how it goes.”
