The Monster Yamaha Tech3 Team riders got straight to work under the blazing sun in San Marino today as the 13th round of the World Championship began. Johann Zarco kicked off proceedings by finishing FP1 in 9th, before continuing his efforts in the afternoon to complete the day in 12th with a gap of only 0.683 separating him from the top. Whilst Jonas Folger got up to speed in the morning after completing the first free practice just 0.084 behind his teammate, before his afternoon performance left him 1.091 back from the leading bike.

Johann Zarco
Position: 12 ^th - Time: 1'33.914 - Laps: 40

“The first day in Misano was positive and I am happy to experience this track on my Yamaha YZR-M1. It’s not easy because this circuit, as I expected, is quite small for the premier class bikes. Therefore, I tried to complete a lot of laps in order to find the best references for myself and then give some good information to my team so that we could set the bike up well. In the afternoon, it was a shame to finish 12th, but when we analyse the times, we can see that we did ok. Now, I need to stay calm and work with my crew and on myself too so that we can improve tomorrow. There, I aim to prepare for the race but also be ready for qualifying where I hope to end up on the front two rows.”

Jonas Folger
Position: 17 ^th - Time: 1'34.322 - Laps: 37

"To be honest, I am not so happy with today. I don’t have a good feeling with the front of the bike at the moment, and I can’t turn or brake in the way that I want to. I had a few moments on the track, but we have to find a solution in order to get the confidence back so that we can get to where we want and need to be. This is the only issue, and now we will work for tomorrow where I am certain that we will improve and then have a strong qualifying."