Jorge Lorenzo felt he should have qualified on the front row at Le Mans today, and only has himself to blame for finishing fourth. The Yamaha team leader was quiet through most of the session as several riders took turns at the top in drying conditions and never looked a contender for pole, finishing almost half a second down on Dani Pedrosa.
“I'm not happy, I wanted to be at least on the front row but it was not possible, Andrea (Dovizioso) was very fast today”, commented the Spaniard. “I didn't make one perfect lap, maybe three or four tenths could be improved with a perfect lap but the track conditions were very difficult today and it was very easy to crash and get injured. We are in fourth position and tomorrow I think we can fight for the podium and the victory. I will try to make a very good start.”
Ben Spies will join his teammate on the third row after qualifying sixth and the American felt the riders who took more chances got their reward today.
“Today was a tricky session for everybody, kind of risky. Finally the track started to come good but the guys who did the better lap times were a little bit more brave than others. With this tarmac it's hard to see if it's wet or dry in some places. We did the best we could and put together a decent lap to get on the second row. It was pretty hard to commit to 110% when the track is like that so the result is good.”
Team Manager Wilco Zeelenberg thought Yamaha underperformed this afternoon but accepted that conditions were very tough given the rain that fell before qualifying.
“A very weird practice and very tricky! In the beginning it was quite wet then began to dry up so it was difficult to know what to do at what time. Finally to not be on the front row is disappointing as we had a good pace yesterday. We improved a little bit but it was quite risky as some of the curbs were still quite wet.”