The third place in the German GP Sprint allows the rider of the Pertamina Enduro VR46 Racing Team to reduce even more the gap to the top of the World Standing. Franco Morbidelli crashes out.
Saturday of the German GP proved to be positive for the Pertamina Enduro VR46 Racing Team, which celebrates another Sprint podium with Fabio Di Giannantonio. At Sachsenring, the rider from Rome is third at the finish line and gets even closer to the top of the World Standing. Unlucky Sprint for Franco Morbidelli, who crashes while he’s in Top10.
Di Giannantonio had a great start from the front row and managed to keep himself in the top positions. Third on the grid (1:19.188), Fabio was one of the main contenders for the podium, and he showed a good pace and great consistency throughout the 15 laps. The rider from Rome crossed the finish line of the Sprint in third place, and he secured his fifth Sprint podium of the season, getting even closer to the top of the World Standing: he now sits third with 184 points, 13 from the leader (the closest gap of the season).
Only the bad luck stopped Morbidelli’s positive Saturday: he started from the third row after securing the direct Q2 and he worked on the management in the opening laps of the Sprint. After starting from the seventh place on the grid (1:19.532), Franco could stay in the Top10 fight. The Italian-Brazilian rider crashed out at Turn 13 – luckily with no physical consequences – while he was tenth. Morbidelli is now sixteenth in the World Standing with 43 points.
The German GP will conclude tomorrow with the main race, scheduled to start at 14:00 (local time).
FABIO DI GIANNANTONIO
“I am very happy with this Sprint podium; we collected other important points for the championship. I made a little mistake at the first corner, but I managed to regain my third place, so I managed as much as I could. In the final laps, I think had something more than the rider ahead, but it was too risky to overtake, especially because of the overheating of the front tyre. It’s very hard to overtake here, so I thought that a third place was ok. For tomorrow, I feel good with medium tyre, and I have a good pace. The riders in front will prove again to be competitive, but even the others will arrive, so we must stay focused. The goal is to keep pushing and continuing on this direction.”
FRANCO MORBIDELLI
“Today I made a great Qualifying, I could do an amazing lap, but we knew that the race pace would have been slower than the time attack that allowed us to be seventh on the grid. In the Sprint, I started from the second row, and I lost some places metres after metres. I was trying to stay there and managing, but at Turn 13 I entered too fast and I lost the front, so I crashed out. Despite this incident, we stay positives because lately we’re improving, we are working hard and well together with the team.”
