Quartararo’s Early Struggles at Mandalika: A Speedy Recovery Hindered by Warm-Up Woes

"Speedy" Fabio Quartararo showcased his pace today, however…

Early race struggles led to Monster Yamaha racers facing consequences at Mandalika.

In the initial stages of Sunday's Indonesian MotoGP, Fabio Quartararo managed to cut his 13.2-second gap to victor Jorge Martin by half.

The Yamaha racer had difficulty warming up the back tire, resulting in a 6.7-second gap from Martin following the first four laps.

The delay caused the French rider to fall from an impressive sixth position on the starting grid to 13th, even though four riders ahead had crashed.

After gaining momentum, Quartararo climbed through the ranks to secure a seventh-place finish, matching his best result of the season, and was only 0.8 seconds behind Martin in the last four laps.

Quartararo believed that if it hadn't been for the initial hiccup, he could have contended with Francesco Bagnaia, Franco Morbidelli, and Marco Bezzecchi for the ultimate podium spot.

Quartararo mentioned that in the initial laps, he dropped down 7-8 places due to the rear medium tyre requiring over 4-5 laps to reach its optimal temperature throughout the weekend.

"My speed was good, but it seems the issue lay in getting the tyre heated up properly. Once that was sorted, I was able to match Bezzecchi's pace, give or take."

"However, we fell behind by six seconds in the initial laps and ended up in 13th place. We remain slower than our competitors, yet today we were significantly closer to Morbidelli, Bagnaia…"

“Beyond the role itself, our current focus should be on the speed of our progress.”

Facing challenges in surpassing others during the Sprint, opting for a hard front tyre instead of a soft one for the grand prix allowed for exceptionally late braking and the opportunity to pass others, aided further by minor errors from a few competitors ahead.

This enabled Quartararo to cross the finish line in seventh position, among the 12 racers who completed the race, matching his season's top performance for the third consecutive time.

Despite losing speed early on, Quartararo finished the race significantly closer to the winner than in his previous outings at Emilia Romagna, where he trailed by 20.9 seconds, and at San Marino's Misano races, where he was 17.6 seconds behind.

"The 2021 world champion remarked, "Our pace was there today, yet there's still a significant gap before we can be satisfied," and continued, "However, today was pretty decent… We managed to put in some solid laps."

Quartararo's top lap fell short by 0.277 seconds compared to the fastest lap set by Enea Bastianini in the race.

Alex Rins described the event as "one of my most challenging races." Initially crossing the finish line in twelfth and last place, Rins was later moved up to eleventh position following a post-race penalty for tyre pressure violations issued to Takaaki Nakagami.

Rins faced difficulty warming up the back tire and, following a pass by Joan Mir, stayed in the final position from the sixth lap to the race's conclusion on the 27th lap.

Rins disclosed, "I struggled significantly to heat up the tire, which resulted in us dropping several places right at the start. This happened because I approached corner 7 without applying any throttle, causing me to completely lose control of the back end."

"We were aware that heating up the back tire would pose a challenge for us, yet the difficulty surpassed our anticipations. I feel somewhat disappointed and frustrated because we kicked off Friday on a good note, but we didn't advance the way I had hoped."

"Saturday presented significant challenges, and today's race in the world championship was exceptionally difficult for me – I ended up in last place! It's crucial for us to examine and understand what went wrong."

"Definitely not my preferred location. However, I'm eagerly anticipating the upcoming race, which, fortunately, is scheduled for next week."

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