Maverick Viñales approached Saturday's Q2 session with a different. Despite the fact that the lengthy track allows little time for multiple hot laps, he waited until most of the other riders had left pit lane before stepping aboard his Yamaha.
Enjoying some clear space, his first attempt saw him settle into fifth position and he quickly followed this up with a provisional front row result, posting a 1'59.673s for second place.
The Spaniard made a quick pit stop with a little less than seven minutes remaining and was ready to put his head down again two minutes later, as the times dropped.
He wasn't able to improve on his next attempt, but turned up the heat on his final flying lap and set a 1'59.538s to move up from fifth to third. However, a last-minute flurry of activity after the chequered flag was already out, saw him end the session in fifth place, 0.326s from the front.
On Sunday he will line up on the second row of the starting grid, right beside his teammate.
"Qualifying was very close, all the riders' times were very close together. We are 0.3s from first and I'm happy,” he said. “In FP3 I didn't feel so well, but then we made some changes on the bike in FP4 and I felt good again. I think that for tomorrow we still have some room for improvement and that's very important.”
‘I feel really good and I think I have a clear idea on which tyre I'll use for the race. I'm especially happy because there were many races where throughout the weekend we didn't make good steps forward, but here we made great progress.”
“We have to be very intelligent about the race, first of all about deciding on the tyres. We have to choose the best option for our bike. In the end I think we have the package, I'm good on the brakes and feel strong there compared to the other riders, so let's see if we can get the job done."
Keen-eyed spectators might have noticed a difference in the livery of the bikes. The Movistar Yamaha MotoGP riders were showing off the orange ENEOS branding on the lower cowling, to highlight the long-standing partnership between Yamaha and JXTG Nippon Oil & Energy (the brand owner of ENEOS), that started in 2012.
