Monster Yamaha Tech3 Team rider Bradley Smith battled the wind at the GoPro Motorrad Grand Prix Deutschland to conclude the opening day of MotoGP action with a highly impressive finish of 2^nd position. The British rider kicked off his weekend by undertaking a shake down with his Yamaha YZR-M1 in preparation for the 30 lap sprint on Sunday and completed the FP1 session in 13th. When the afternoon practice started, he continued to adjust the setup and assess the tyre options before undertaking a total of 27 laps around the 3.7 kilometre circuit. By the fall of the chequered flat, he had set a blistering time of 1’21.740 which left him only 0.119 from the top of the heap. His performance now leaves him confident of surging to a strong grid position in the all-important qualifying session tomorrow.

On the other side of the Monster Yamaha Tech3 team garage, Pol Espargaro opened his 2015 MotoGP campaign at the Sachsenring by completing the first day of action in 13^th place in the combined standings. The young Spaniard began the initial shake down in FP1 with a run to 12th position after suffering an unfortunate fall at the notoriously difficult turn 11. However, he sprinted back to the pits and leapt onto his second Yamaha YZR-M1 before concluding the session in this placement. When free practice two began, he continued his work at the tight and twisting German track as he undertook a total of 21 laps before finishing with a best time of 1’22.436, leaving him in 13th. Nevertheless, this lap left him just over six tenths of a second back from third and he now looks onwards to tomorrow where he intends to snatch a top starting position for the ninth round battle on Sunday.

"It was a positive start to the weekend and I am feeling comfortable on the bike already. The base setting seems to be working well at this race track and I am looking forward to getting back out tomorrow and continuing this form. In addition, I’m happy about our showing today especially after the difficult time that we had last year. We were able to assess quite a lot of different front tyre options today and now we pretty much have everything clear for the race with regards to tyre choice. There are a few small details that we need to improve, which I noticed when I was following some other riders. Furthermore, I’m happy with how the bike handles the first and third sectors, but we need to make a few adjustments in order to improve in the other two. All in all, to be second at the end of day one is a strong start and now we need to keep this momentum for tomorrow, because qualifying is always so important at this circuit."

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"It goes without saying that it has been quite a tricky opening day to the weekend. Unfortunately I crashed this morning, which meant that we lost a pair of tyres so I had to start the afternoon session with a used set. Still, our rhythm was really promising as I was running in 8th position despite the fact that the tyres had reached almost race distance. However, I then entered the pits and changed tyres for the final run but when I returned to the track, my feeling on the bike was just not the same anymore. This happened to Bradley in Assen and also to us quite a few times this year, yet it’s always better to have something like this happen on a Friday instead of later on in the weekend. Nevertheless, I am happy with how the bike is working even though we still have a degree of improvement to make in some areas. Most importantly, we have to be wise tomorrow because we now have one set of tyres less but we are still confident of clinching a strong result here this weekend in Germany."

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