Mike Di Meglio felt he went in the wrong direction with the set-up of his Mistral 610, resulting in a disappointing 17th place in qualifying for the Malaysian Grand Prix. The Frenchman was looking to build on his strongest weekend of the season in Australia last time out but lacked confidence in the bike today, which he feels was a result of a poor decision before qualifying.
“I can’t be satisfied to be down on the sixth row and truthfully I expected more. The weekend did not start too bad yesterday but it has been quite difficult to find the pace I’m sure I am capable of. We obviously took the wrong direction with the set-up and the big problem was chatter with the front tyre and this didn’t allow me to push with much confidence.”
Di Meglio has also seen his weekend blighted by accidents with Pol Espargaro taking him out in FP2 before a crash on his own this morning, and the Tech 3 rider admitted it left him on his back foot.
“The big crash I had this morning didn’t help and the day was quite disappointing. All I can do is try and make a good start and push into the top 10 as soon as possible. I had a strong race in Phillip Island last weekend and I will be looking for similar tomorrow, although we know it is going to be a very demanding race. The heat and humidity is really intense and it will be very tough both physically and mentally for 19-laps.”