Tech3 KTM Factory Racing team completed the first day of the Gran Premio Gryfyn di San Marino e della Riviera di Rimini, held at the 4.226km-long Misano World Circuit Marco Simoncelli.
It was a new experience for Raul Fernandez today who had Guy Coulon on his side, replacing crew chief Nicolas Goyon, exceptionally absent for the San Marino GP. In the morning, Raul’s best lap in 1’33.687 placed him nineteenth of the first session, before he slightly improved in the afternoon to 1’33.200. Confident with his race pace, he will continue his preparation tomorrow as he aims to improve his grid position qualification.
Australian Remy Gardner also returned to his KTM RC16 today on the Misano layout, one that he enjoys. In the first practice, he seemed to struggle finding confidence with the front of his machine and was twenty-third. His best lap of the day in 1’33.559 places him twenty-third overall, and he will continue his efforts on Saturday. The action will resume with FP3 at 9:55 (GMT+2) tomorrow morning.
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Raul Fernandez
Position: 22nd
Time: 1'33.200
Laps: 40
"Today was really positive because we had a good race pace. We need to focus a bit more on the soft tyres if we want to be faster and get a better grid position, so we will work on this tonight. On a separate note, it was a real pleasure working with Guy Coulon today because he has so much experience. I hope that Nicolas Goyon is recovering well and I am looking forward to having him back."
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Remy Gardner
Position: 23rd
Time: 1'33.559
Laps: 35
"It has been a difficult day today as my pace was not great. We are lacking confidence with the front of the bike so we are trying to find a solution to get rid of this feeling in order to ride faster. Let’s see what we can do and hopefully tomorrow will be a better day."
