Deniz Oncu placed 12^th at the end of a chaotic first day of the Brazilian Grand Prix, while Aron Canet was 18^th.

The fast, flowing Autódromo Internacional de Goiânia – Ayrton Senna hosts the first Grand Prix on Brazilian soil since 2004 this weekend.

The weather didn’t play ball on Friday. The day’s sessions were delayed by one hour due to heavy overnight rain, which meant parts of the track had to be cleared before the morning’s running. FP1 was held in fully wet conditions.

Showers that threatened thankfully held off for the afternoon Practice session, which allowed the Elf Marc VDS Racing Team riders to get a feel for the 3.84km, 14-Turn layout in dry conditions.

Aron Canet – 18^th, 1’25.034

In wet, gloomy conditions in FP1, Aron took advantage of the high levels of grip and good feeling as he set the 10^th fastest time.

With the threat of rain never far away in the afternoon, Aron was in a hurry early on to set a fast lap time in the dry conditions at the start of Practice.

As the track got faster as the session progressed, the Spaniard found his tyres were past their best when he was pushing late on. Although 18^th, Aron is confident of big improvements on Saturday.

“I wasn’t showing my full potential”

Aron’s comments:

“A difficult day! It’s a fun track here in Brazil and in the wet conditions my feeling was pretty good. But in the dry I wasn’t quite as comfortable. Also, in the afternoon I found that, lap-by-lap, my Pirelli tyres started to drop so I wasn’t showing my full potential when I needed to do a time attack in the last laps. But we know this and we’re sure we can improve well for tomorrow.”

Deniz Oncu – 12^th, 1’24.532

Conditions were far from ideal for Deniz to learn the second shortest track layout on the calendar. Not overly confident in the wet, the Turkish rider was 22^nd in FP1.

The dry conditions on Friday afternoon were a different matter, however. The 22-year old felt much more comfortable in the dry.

That showed as he set his fastest time of the day on his very last lap to place 12^th, just 0.8s off pace setter Tony Arbolino.

“It’s beautiful around the circuit and also the track layout is very nice”

Deniz’s comments:

“The first day here in Brazil is done. It’s a new track for us to learn and also a new atmosphere! It’s beautiful around the circuit and also the track layout is very nice. I was hoping for three dry days because I don’t enjoy the wet as much. Anyway, today we survived and managed to get a place in Q2 for tomorrow. Now, we’ll continue working for the race. I’ll be praying for dry conditions on Sunday, as I definitely felt more comfortable today in the afternoon than the morning, when it was wet. We’ll keep pushing and working for tomorrow.”