Action begins at San Juan Villicum Circuit with riders facing challenging conditions

2019-10-13 14:31
The opening day of the Argentinean round at the San Juan Villicum Circuit played out in hot and sunny conditions. Track conditions, on the other hand, proved quite challenging for the riders, the surface dusty and slippery.

Hotter temperatures during the afternoon didn’t help the situation in terms of grip, and lap times remained considerably higher with respect to last year’s references. The first day concluded with Ryuichi Kiyonari in 16th and Leon Camier in 18th place.

Tomorrow’s final Free Practice session has been extended by 15 minutes, meaning that FP3 will take place from 10:30 to 11:05 am local time. The Superpole will follow at 13:00 and Race 1 at 16.00 local time.

Ryuichi Kiyonari 23
16TH 1'47.613
“This circuit seems good in terms of the layout, and it’s a nice one to ride, but honestly it’s very difficult to find any positives regarding the track conditions we have found here. The asphalt is dusty, dirty and slippery and the grip did not improve over the course of the day. I expected it to be better in the afternoon once some other sessions had taken place but that was not the case, in fact the opposite was true. So all in all, it was quite a difficult day”.

Ryuichi Kiyonari
Leon Camier 2
18TH 1'47.988
“Today’s conditions made it very difficult for me to ride. Unfortunately, the track is really very dirty, one of the worst I’ve seen. Through some corners I can’t even put my knee down. I saw some of the other riders out on track and they are probably working better than I did, but even the fastest riders are several seconds slower than last year. We made some changes to the set up and found something of a direction, but the situation looks quite challenging for this moment”.

Leon Camier
Free Practice 2 Combined
Pos. Rider Num Nation Team Time/Gap
1
BAUTISTA
Alvaro 19 SPA ARUBA Racing - Ducati 1'43.614
2
REA
Jonathan 1 GBR Kawasaki Racing Team WorldSBK 0.104
3
RINALDI
Michael Ruben 21 ITA BARNI Racing Team 1.229
4
DAVIES
Chaz 7 GBR ARUBA Racing - Ducati 1.252
5
SYKES
Tom 66 GBR BMW Motorrad WorldSBK Team 1.320
6
RAZGATLIOGLU
Toprak 54 TUR Turkish Puccetti Racing 1.331
7
HASLAM
Leon 91 GBR Kawasaki Racing Team WorldSBK 1.397
8
CORTESE
Sandro

Source: HRC

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