This weekend the 3rd round of the World Supersport Championship takes place at Estoril (Portugal). After two first rounds below expectations, the GMT94 team hopes to turn things around, on a circuit that has generally been successful for the team.
Following his surgery for compartment syndrome, Andy Verdoia has passed a first step here in Portugal. 3rd in FP1, Andy was able to set several fast laps. The target in FP2 was to work on the race pace in order to be consistent in the fast laps.
Jules Cluzel had a slightly different set-up to his teammate in the morning session, but still managed to get 7th place in the session. This set the direction for the set-up in FP2.
Andy had great start in the session, getting into the pace very quickly. The rider from Nice was second overall for a long time, before being dethroned by his teammate. The GMT94 riders finished in 2nd and 3rd place overall.
Jules Cluzel : ” It’s a good day. Andy didn’t have exactly the same settings as me this morning, and he rode well. In FP2 we followed this direction, the bike was good so I worked on myself to find my pace. We were supposed to change to a fresh tire at the end of the session, but in the end I preferred to work on a used tire because I needed to improve in these conditions first. I managed to do it on one lap with a good improvement. Now we need to keep this pace over several laps, we will work with the team to achieve this, but it is still encouraging.“
Andy Verdoïa: “Today I managed to get some fast laps, which is a good thing. I quickly got into the pace, which allowed me to work from the beginning of the session. Now we need to work on the race pace to keep it for 18 laps.“
See you tomorrow at 10:25 am, then at 3:30 pm live on Eurosport the Superpole session, and the Supersport race 1!