Tony Arbolino was proud of the Elf Marc VDS Racing Team and his performance after he qualified fifth for the San Marino GP, while Senna Agius made steady improvements in 25^th.

• Despite brief showers of rain disrupting MotoGP qualifying on Saturday afternoon, the Misano World Circuit Marco Simoncelli remained dry for the two Moto2 qualifying shootouts.
• After the rain during lunchtime, the track grip was slightly reduced for the Moto2 field, meaning Tony Arbolino did an excellent job to qualify on the second row for his home GP.

/// TONY ARBOLINO,  5th – 1’36.397

• In a competitive FP3 session, Tony showed solid rhythm, as well as strong one lap pace. His best time of 1’36.580s was just 0.473 off the fastest time and was good enough for tenth place.
• After making improvements to the front end of his bike, which aided his feel in Misano’s numerous braking zones, the 22-year old was competitive through qualifying and was 0.401s off pole position. Fifth place is his best qualifying result since the Spanish GP in May.

“We were trying to work on the small details to be better”

“Qualifying was good. We are working really well this weekend. Yesterday we made a small but very important step forward. We were trying to work on the small details to be better but I feel really confident on the bike. We’re trying to improve the front end but that’s it. I want to thank my crew. They still believe in me. The target was the first two rows. We’ll start from the second so we need to be happy and proud. We’ll try to improve the front end tomorrow morning and be prepared for the race. I don’t know what the weather will be like, whether there will be rain or not, but I feel prepared for all conditions. We will try to keep the pace with the fastest guys. I’m proud of today because we showed our potential. We’re still there and I feel we can do a good race tomorrow”

/// SENNA AGIUS, 25th – 1’37.567

• In just his second round in the World Championship, the Australian continued his adaptation process to the team and bike and steadily got faster through Saturday, placing 26^th in FP3 and 25^th in qualifying.
• By qualifying, Senna improved his personal best time around this track by nearly a full second from FP1 and was just 1.5s off pole position. He feels comfortable in braking zones and is confident of making a number of overtakes in tomorrow’s race.

“I have to focus on just being calm all race”

“Today’s been a bit difficult. This weekend has been harder for me due to a few different things. In qualifying I just did my best. I pushed every single lap to the maximum. Unfortunately, our strategy was just to go and do my laps and I had a few people behind me that were a little bit faster. But that’s the way it is. I gave my maximum and I’ll do the same tomorrow in the race. I have to focus on just being calm all race. I lost that a little bit of calm in Austria and it affected me. I think we’re really strong on the brakes this weekend so we can make some positions up on the first lap. I’ll go out there and enjoy it!”