Both Tony Arbolino and Filip Salac have identified areas to work on and remain confident after they finished Friday afternoon 15^th and 25^th respectively.

• For the first time since September, 2022, the spectacular Motorland Aragon Circuit hosted a day of practice for the Moto2 World Championship, with Elf Marc VDS Racing Team riders Tony Arbolino and Filip Salac riding in high temperatures throughout the day (30 degrees in the afternoon).
• The 5.08km circuit has recently been resurfaced, and the grip of the new surface was very low in Friday morning’s FP session. The high temperatures in the afternoon meant the track was still slippery and challenging in P1.

/// TONY ARBOLINO, 15th – 1’52.001

• Still on a high after his best result of the year last time out in Austria, Tony started the day strongly, setting the 2^nd fastest time in the morning session while showing good rhythm.
• Having worked on rear tyre choice and performance in P1, the Italian struggled with a lack of rear grip in the hot afternoon conditions. He placed 15^th at the close of the 40-minute session.

“I’m confident we can turn this around”

“This morning I had quite a good feeling out there and we had good rhythm as well. But this afternoon we started with the hard rear tyre and I immediately felt there was something that wasn’t helping our tyre work at its best. The feeling was so strange. Then we put the new soft tyres in near the end of the session, both front and rear. But I wasn’t feeling so good with the bike and it was similar to the first run. We had to make a double effort just to repeat the lap time we managed earlier in the day. So that means we need to change something for tomorrow morning. We’ll go through the data this evening with the team to find a solution. But I’m feeling competitive and I’m confident we can turn this around!”

/// FILIP SALAC, 25^th – 1’52.704

• Filip started the day by sampling some different settings and adjustments to the balance of the bike. The Czech rider took some time to get used to the low grip conditions as he placed 22^nd in FP.
• In the afternoon the 22-year old tested both the soft and medium rear tyres with Sunday’s 19-lap race in mind. Despite gaining confidence through the session, he found himself 25^th at the close of the day.
• Filip was also handed a 3 place grid penalty for Sunday’s race after FIM Stewards judged that he impeded Deniz Oncu at the end of P1.

“Lap by lap we’re getting closer”

“It’s been a hard day for us. From Free Practice this morning I wasn’t feeling so good on the bike because the grip of the track was a bit strange. I wasn’t so confident to push toward the limit. Lap by lap we’re getting closer but for the moment we are a bit far from the top guys. We’re missing a few points and we need to work hard for tomorrow and do more laps to understand everything. In the afternoon during P1 I started feeling better toward the end of the session, which was important. We can see that we’re lacking some set-up information after we missed nearly all of the test here. If we had managed 60 laps that day it would have been better but it is what it is so let’s keep pushing to achieve the best qualifying result possible tomorrow.”