A few raindrops were enough to ruin Fabio Quartararo’s day and mood. The Frenchman knew that Yamaha would suffer at the Red Bull Ring, but the morning sensations had given him hope. “It went quite well – he commented on his eighth fastest time – when you consider that I hadn’t changed the tires at the end of the session and that after a five long week break it always takes some time to regain confidence, the M1 ran better than last year ”.
Then the bad weather hit the track and when Fabio came out of the pits on rain tires that afternoon, everything was different.
“I had no confidence – he admitted – All in all, when the track was completely wet I wasn’t among the best but it was still going well, but when it started to dry the situation got worse. It’s really strange, I’ve done a few laps with Pol Espargarò and Martin, I wasn’t bad when braking and in the middle of the corner, but when accelerating it was a real disaster because I didn’t have any grip. FP2 was a nightmare ”.
Quartararo is convinced that the problem lies with the Yamaha …
“Experience has nothing to do with it, Valentino is the rider who has the most and he has the same problems as me – he emphasized – in 2019, in my first MotoGP year, I was always in the top 10 when it was wet difficult routes such as Brno, Phillip Island, Motegi. I don’t like rain very much but I was one of the first so a solution needs to be found as there is a chance it will rain on Sunday. I’m disappointed”.
Also because many drivers turned out to be quick in the wet, while Fabio couldn’t get past 15th place.
“I didn’t enjoy riding and when that happens it’s not good – the Frenchman continued – I’m not that bad under these conditions, I was on the podium at Le Mans, but something has changed since last year. It is not normal to be so far from the front runners, Vinales has problems too, albeit a little less than me. I don’t really know what to say, we need to understand what to do and carefully analyze the data collected today.