The Pertamina Enduro VR46 Racing Team secures the direct spot in Q2 with Fabio Di Giannantonio, who is third in the Practice. Franco Morbidelli is seventeenth.
The Australian Gran Prix starts in a promising way for Fabio Di Giannantonio, who claims a direct Q2 spot after securing the third place in Friday’s Practice. On the other side of the garage, Franco Morbidelli will go through Q1, having missed out the Top10.
Di Giannantonio started the Phillip Island weekend with the ninth place in the FP1, improving lap by lap. In the Practine, he proved to be competitive both in the time attack and in the race pace. After leading the timesheet for most of the session, Fabio ended his Friday in third place (1:26.912), securing direct access to Q2.
It was a more complicated start to the weekend for Morbidelli, who suffered a crash at Turn 1 in the early stages on FP1. No physical consequences for the rider, but his session was affected, and he missed out the Top10. Franco improved his time lap in the Practice, but it wasn’t enough for him to secure the direct Q2. With the seventeenth place, he will go through Q1.
The Pertamina Enduro VR46 Racing Team is back on track on Saturday for qualifying, which begins at 10:50 a.m. (local time, +9 CET). The Sprint race will follow at 3:00 p.m. (local time). The Australian Gran Prix will end on Sunday with the main race, that will start at 2 p.m. (local time).
FABIO DI GIANNANTONIO
“I enjoy so much riding here, this place is incredible! I bring a lot of energy and motivation to the track, because I want to enjoy every lap, since we are not riding so often here. The day was positive, we’ve been quite fast, the feeling with the front was really good from the start. We’re working in the right way, the feeling was improving more and more, and at the end, we were able to do a good time attack. We still have a couple of tenths to improve in the time attack, but we are happy with the race pace. It’s just Friday, let’s keep the feet on the ground, but it was a great start to the weekend.”
FRANCO MORBIDELLI
“It was a tough Friday, I’ve been struggling all day long, I wasn’t fast. At the moment, stability is the main issue, I have lots of movements and I can’t bring the speed that I want into the corner. In the FP1 I had a crash, it was a fast one, but luckily everything is good. It was early in the session, it was at the third lap, maybe I got in a bit too excited to be in Phillip Island, a track that I love. We need to work this afternoon and tonight to improve for tomorrow.”
