“A day without problems” for Joan Mir but key Malaysian MotoGP concern remains
Joan Mir was fast from the beginning on Friday at the Malaysian MotoGP but he has one concern for the races.
Hearing Joan Mir speak about the ease with which he found lap time during a MotoGP weekend has been a rarity in his Honda career, but increasingly less so. Practice at the Malaysian Grand Prix might have been his best aboard the RC213V yet, finishing fourth-fastest after “a day without many problems” at Sepang.
Mir was one of two Hondas in the top-10, along with Johann Zarco in second, and the Spaniard was positively relaxed about his day, which he described as “very easy” having been fast from the beginning of MotoGP FP1.
“It was a good day,” Joan Mir concluded, speaking to MotoGP.com after Friday in Malaysia.
“A day without many problems.
“We were able to be fast in minute one of FP1, and that makes our life very easy today. We just adjusted the bike for the conditions at the moment and every time we were out on-track we improved.”
However, Mir has concerns over tyre life – not necessarily that he knows he’s struggling for tyre endurance, but that he’s not certain that he will not struggle.
“There are still some question marks like the tyres and which one is better, if the soft can reach the end of the race,” he explained.
“We have to work a little bit more on the race pace side, but the important thing is that when everyone pushes and we push we are there in front.”
He added: “ t’s not that we struggle in one point in particular, we just have to understand if we can make the race with not a huge drop on the rear tyre – and also the front, we don’t know how the bike reacts with 10, 12, 15 laps.
“So, that’s important that we understand tomorrow.”
Marini “unlucky” to miss Q2
While there were two Hondas in Q2 directly from Practice, three seemed a possibility.
Mir's Honda HRC Castrol teammate, Luca Marini, missed out, however, finishing 12th in the end.
The Italian blamed the timing of the rain, and then traffic on his second time attack, for his inability to make the top-10 in Practice.
“Unlucky this Friday, bad luck in the last ten minutes,” Marni said.
“I was spending a lot of time on track in the afternoon working on our pace and setting for the race so when I went out with the first tyre, that’s when it started to rain.
“We had the possibility to stay in Q2, but on my final flying lap other riders were there in sector four and I had to lift.
“The important thing is that we can see clearly the progress we have made since the winter test here and it’s really impressive.
“Q1 tomorrow will be tough with the other riders but like we’ve seen today, a lot can happen and we never give up.”
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