Baldassarri delivers stunning start in Argentina, Marini not far from the top

This weekend the Forward Racing Team duo is back on track in Termas de Río Hondo for the second round of the 2017 Moto2 World Championship, after travelling nearly 14,000 km from Qatar to Argentina to start the first of two flyaway events on the American continent. Thereby Lorenzo Baldassarri kicked off the day with an awesome performance, conquering the top of the whole field with a fastest lap of 1’44.943 during the first free practice in the morning. The 20-year old even lowered his best time in FP2 by almost half a second and is already looking forward to the remainder of the second encounter. Meanwhile Luca Marini, fresh from his impressive sixth place finish in Losail, took his time to adapt to the 4.806 km circuit. After scoring a personal best of 1’46.553 in FP1 the 19-year old Italian improved his time significantly during the afternoon session. Marini managed to cut off 1.4 seconds and reduced the gap to the front to less than one second. The Argentina Grand Prix is set to resume tomorrow at 10.55am with the third practice of the weekend, before the all-important qualifying starts at 3.05pm local time (8.05pm CET).

Lorenzo Baldassarri – 4th (1’44.447) “I’m really pleased about this first day here, plus I’m very confident with the package we have. From the word go we performed well and were already truly fast in the first practice. Yet, we had a minor issue with the bike at the start of FP2, which forced me to come back to the garage, however, we solved it immediately. As soon as I was back on track my rhythm was fast again. In the end, I tried to push even more, but unfortunately, I couldn’t finish my best lap, which would have placed us even higher in the combined standings. Thanks to the whole Forward Racing Team for their great job today. For tomorrow, we will stay focussed and try to keep this momentum for qualifying.”

Luca Marini – 21st (1’45.138) “It hasn’t quite been the start I expected. In FP1 I struggled to find the right feeling with my bike, plus the wind was a bit disturbing, too. However, after analysing the data, we made some modifications on the bike which enabled us to progress in FP2, but when I went out with the new tyre, I found it tricky to post a really fast lap. Anyway, there are still plenty of positives to take from today as my confidence on the bike improved significantly during the second session and we were able to reduce the gap to the front. We will continue to work in this direction tomorrow morning and I´m sure that we will be ready for the first qualifying of the year.”

Giovanni Cuzari – Team Owner “To see Lorenzo’s fantastic performance this morning has been a great satisfaction for me and another proof for the fantastic preparation of our team. It goes without saying, that there’s still a lot of work to do for Sunday’s race, but it’s definitely a positive way to kick off the proceedings. On the other hand, Luca didn’t find it as easy as Lorenzo to adapt to the track this morning, but the experience of his crew will certainly allow him to make up some time tomorrow. In FP2 he already improved his pace by nearly 1.5 seconds, which shows, that we are on the right path. In conclusion, I want to express a special thanks to our technical sponsor SC Project for their fantastic work, as they continuously try to give our riders the most competitive material in order to support our venture.”