Alex Rins leads the race at Silverstone for a while, but ends up only seventh – tyre to blame – Joan Mir crashes with laps to go
At one of his favourite tracks, Alex Rins finally wanted to be in contention for victory again on the MotoGP weekend at Silverstone. After all, the Suzuki rider had been on the podium here on the last two occasions.
And this time, too, the Spaniard’s pace looked promising. In qualifying on Saturday, however, it was only enough for eleventh place on the grid. Michelin and his team made a mistake with the tyres and inadvertently gave him a hard front tyre instead of a soft one in the first run, which cost him valuable time.
In the race, however, Rins was able to make up a few positions at the start and finished the first lap in fifth place. After five laps, he was already second, also aided by the crash of front-runner Johann Zarco, and eventually caught Jack Miller to take the lead.
Rins: “It was very strange “
There Rins held on until lap 11, then was overtaken by eventual race winner Francesco Bagnaia and dropped as low as seventh in the closing stages.
“I was devastated, but not because of my performance,” said the Suzuki rider. “I gave my maximum. When I was in front, I was riding very smoothly and had the situation under control. But then suddenly I lost grip on the rear wheel and started to slide,” he explained his problems.
“We have to check the data together with Michelin, because it was not normal. In the last five or six laps I was struggling to stay within the two minutes. I did 2:00.1, which was very strange. But at least it was still enough for seventh place. “
“In a couple of corners I was making small mistakes, going in the 2:00.2, 2:00.4 range. But then the tyre degraded so quickly and I panicked because I couldn’t hold the position. Normally we handle the tyres well and have room to manoeuvre at the end. So I don’t know what happened this time.”
While Rins was struggling with the rear tyre, teammate Joan Mir was struggling with the front tyre: “It was warmer than the previous days. I did a lot of laps in the group and that caused my front tyre to overheat more than I would have liked. “
Overheated front tyre on Mir
While Rins was struggling with the rear tyre, teammate Joan Mir was struggling with the front tyre: “It was warmer than the previous days. I was doing a lot of laps in the group and that made my front tyre overheat more than I would have liked. “
“Rins was struggling with the rear tyre.
“I think that’s why I crashed,” explained the Spaniard about his front wheel slide in turn 7 five laps before the end of the race. Although he tried to ride in clean air every now and then to cool down the tyre, “but it was difficult in the group”. For Mir it was already the sixth retirement.
At the time of the crash he was in seventh place. “The feeling on the bike was good, but we lost in some places,” he said. “From turn 16 to the main straight I lost maybe three, four tenths. We need to work on our grip especially. “
