On the second Saturday in a row at the Red Bull Ring, the overall performance of the Aprilia riders showed promising improvement, made less tangible only by a less-than-optimum qualifying session.
Bradley Smith improved his times consistently, continuing to focus on preparing for tomorrow’s race. A little hiccup in Q1 during his flying lap resulted in the sixth row on the starting grid, a position from which he’ll start his hunt for the points zone.
After the outstanding pace demonstrated in FP4, the session that was most representative of the values in race terms, Aleix Espargaró started the first qualifying session in good form. Unfortunately, a technical problem complicated his second run, keeping him from improving his time. This means that the Spanish rider will be starting from the seventh row.
