Fifth row start for McPhee at home GP

2021-08-30 07:06
PETRONAS Sprinta Racing’s Moto3 riders faced a difficult Qualifying session, with continued cold conditions at Silverstone. After only being able to complete one flying lap, John McPhee will start the BritishGP from the fifth row in 15th, with Darryn Binder one row behind in 16th.

McPhee bided his time until the end of FP3 to set his ultimate flying lap, to allow time to adjust to the cold conditions. The Scot secured his place in Q2 with the seventh fastest time in FP3 – 2mins 11.978secs – and ninth overall. After his Qualifying strategy failed to go to plan, John was only able to set one flying lap at the closing stages of the session. After setting a 2mins 13.074secs lap, McPhee will start his home GP from 15th – the fifth row of the grid.

Binder stayed at the sharp end of the timing screens throughout FP3, despite being forced wide on a couple of laps. His best time of 2mins 11.415secs placed him third in session and overall, which secured his place in Q2. Echoing his team-mate’s fortune in Q2, the South African also had only one chance to set his flying lap. Darryn will be starting the BritishGP from the sixth row of the grid, after posting the 16th fastest time – 2mins 13.643secs.

Tomorrow’s track action for McPhee and Binder will begin with Warm Up at 9am local time (4pm MYT), with the 17-lap Moto3 race due to get underway at 11.20am local time (6.20pm MYT).






John McPhee
15th (2'13.074)





Thankfully the pain isn’t too bad after the crash yesterday, I’m just a little tight in my lower back and it is affecting my movement on the bike a bit. Clinica Mobile are helping me as well, so hopefully tomorrow we’ll be even better. Honestly I’m disappointed with Q2 because we had a strategy but it didn’t go to plan. I wasn’t sure where my pace was, due to the crash yesterday, so we decided to go out as a team today, rather than alone. It wasn’t ideal having only one lap at the end and it’s something we won’t be doing again. It is possible to do anything from 15th on the Moto3 grid, especially with a lap this long, so I’ll rest tonight and get prepared for tomorrow.

Source: SIC Racing Team

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