Cal Crutchlow is looking forward to a repeat of his epic battle with Valentino Rossi and Marc Marquez from last year’s British Grand Prix after topping the timesheets at Silverstone today. The home favourite was fastest this afternoon ahead of Rossi’s Yamaha with a lap time quicker than the current circuit record.
The LCR Honda rider was cautiously optimistic over his prospects, mindful that tyre management will play a key role later in the weekend, but couldn’t have any complaints over his Friday running.
“I feel good, my bike’s working well, but tomorrow’s another day and it could easily not be as good as today. We know that. Nothing’s ever easy. We’ll try our best to make it happen but today was just one of those days everything went quite well. I felt good in FP1 with the soft front tyre which is not usually my style but this afternoon we used the harder one, and it’s too soft because the track temperature has gone up! It’s the only option we’ve got and we’ll have to try and make it work as well as possible.”
“I pushed a little but I don’t think anywhere near my 100% as I had a really used front tyre. I also nearly went down at the last corner, that would’ve been big!”
Despite his own pace, Crutchlow fully expects Rossi and Marquez to be fiercely difficult to beat and the Briton also identified 2016 winner Maverick Vinales as another key rival.
“Even though today’s gone good, I could easily find myself off the podium because Vale and Maverick are very fast, one on the soft tyre and one on the hard. Vale, on the last lap will be difficult to beat if you’re in a battle and Marc’s gonna be there, 100%, but I had a good scrap last year so I’m up for another one this year.”
