Team Estrella Galicia 0,0 Marc VDS rider Jack Miller is on target to continue his run of top ten performances in tomorrow’s Spanish Grand Prix.

Miller has opened the 2017 season in superb form with three consecutive top ten results. He will start the fourth round of the MotoGP World Championship from 10th on the gird following his fastest ever lap of the 4.4km Jerez circuit in qualifying.

The 22-year-old Australian posted a time of 1’39.125 in a blisteringly fast session to be within 0.8s of pole sitter Dani Pedrosa.

Jerez was bathed in sunshine for qualifying with a track temperature of 40 degrees and the near perfect conditions were in contrast to the wet and cooler weather for Friday’s practice sessions.

Miller is unconcerned to be starting on the fourth row having focussed intensely on his race set-up during practice with tomorrow’s 27-lap encounter set to test both rider and tyre endurance.

Despite posting his fastest time of the weekend so far Tito Rabat will start from 18th on the sixth row having been slowed by traffic on his final run. 

In the earlier FP4 session while running in race trim Rabat was impressively 10th quickest, just 0.6s behind factory Honda star Marc Márquez.

The Spanish GP will be the 3,000th Grand Prix since the World Championship began in 1949.

Jack Miller: 10th – 1’39.125
“My focus this weekend has been on putting in a lot of laps on races tyres ready for another top ten finish and that’s what we concentrated on in practice. In qualifying I felt really comfortable and tenth on the grid is positive for me because it was a really fast session and I did my fastest ever lap at Jerez. We are in good shape for the race tomorrow.”

Tito Rabat: 18th – 1’39.564
“I am very happy with my result in FP4 because I made the lap time alone on race tyres. I had a good strategy for qualifying but could not do my maximum because of traffic in the final sector of my fast run. I'm not happy for this but overall it has been a positive weekend and my time of 1’39.5 gives me a lot of confidence to score points in the race.”

Michael Bartholemy: Team Principal
“I was impressed by Tito today who was on top ten pace in FP4 and doing his times alone which is very important to prepare for the race. Tito is a little frustrated to be 18th on the grid after he hit traffic in qualifying, which did not allow him to show his full potential. Jack did a great job to go directly into the Q2 session and he has very good race pace. We know Jack starts very fast and is always strong on the opening laps so he is in a good position to challenge for another top ten finish tomorrow.”