Tony Arbolino enjoyed a strong Saturday at the Malaysian Grand Prix, as he qualified 6^th for Sunday’s Moto2 race, while Filip Salac came through Q1 to place 10^th.

• The weather was once more a factory on Saturday morning at the Sepang International Circuit as rain peppered the track throughout Practice 2, which led to brief lulls in the action, but saw the field continue lapping with slick tyres.
• The rain thankfully stayed away for the afternoon, meaning Elf Marc VDS Racing Team riders Tony Arbolino and Filip Salac rode in slightly cooler ambient temperatures of 31 degrees for Moto2 qualifying, which got underway at 13.45 local time.

/// TONY ARBOLINO, 6^th – 2’04.756

• After struggling for consistency across Friday, Tony started the day in promising fashion as he improved his Friday time by an amazing 1.2s to place 3^rd in P2.
• In a tight qualifying session, the Italian featured toward the front throughout. His 1^st flying lap proved to be his fastest of the 15 minutes, as he caught a yellow flag for another rider’s crash on his final run.

“I’ll be aggressive from the start as always”

“It wasn’t a bad Saturday. My feelings on the bike were definitely better than yesterday. We made some improvements and I changed my riding style to try and compensate for the lack of rear grip. I found a lot of time on track today, which was a positive thing. I’m happy to start from the second row, which isn’t bad for tomorrow’s race. I’ll be aggressive from the start as always and believe I have competitive rhythm. We’ll see how it plays out, but I believe I can have a strong Sunday, which would be a perfect way to round off this run of overseas races.”

/// FILIP SALAC, 10^th – 2’04.937

• Having complained of traction issues through Friday, Filip’s crew made a few small changes to set-up on Saturday morning. Despite improving his P1 time by over 0.5s in P2, he was 15^th, which put him in Q1.
• The Czech rider placed 2^nd in that session, before posting his best time of the weekend in Q2 in a ridiculously tight 15-minutes shootout. While he was just 0.5s off pole position, he found himself in 10^th.

“I’m confident of fighting through for a good result”

“It was a tough day here at Sepang. There were a few drops of rain falling in the morning session, which meant we had to stay in the box a bit longer than we wanted and deprived us of track time. Our strategy didn’t include that, and in the end, we made a mistake with the tyre when I got back to the box. It meant I could only make one lap. We were in Q1 but I knew I could pass through to Q2 because I’ve been fast all weekend. I did that but in Q2 I had just one set of tyres, which meant I had to do the lap time in the beginning before finishing up early. It was a difficult day but I think tenth position is a good place to start for tomorrow’s race and I’m confident of fighting through for a good result.”