British MotoGP™: Brad loses out on Top 10
'I made a massive mistake with my tyre choice' – Krugersdorp's Brad Binder after finishing 11th in the British MotoGP™.
Red Bull KTM Factory Racing’s Miguel Oliveira rode brilliantly in Great Britain for the 12th date of 20 in 2022 and for what was KTM’s 100th MotoGP™ start.
The Portuguese equalled the brand’s best result at Silverstone with 6th position as South African teammate from Krugersdorp, Brad Binder, took 11th and bagged five points.
Also read: Brad within reach of top dogs
MotoGP fired to 20 intense laps at a sunny Silverstone for the Monster Energy British Grand Prix and with KTM RC16s starting from the fifth, sixth and eighth rows of the grid. The rapid and long 18-corner course was a wide, technical challenge for the riders and created a 12-rider strong group pushing for podium contention.
Miguel looked quick through Free Practice and missed out on direct Q2 qualification by just a few hundredths of a second but had decent race pace and showed it. He circulated initially on the edge of the top ten with Brad in tow but then started to overtake and make progress, eventually passing world championship leader Fabio Quartararo for a well-earned 6th place.
Brad, who started alongside Miguel on the grid, was also making gains on the lap chart but the medium rear tyre choice on the hottest day of the Silverstone weekend so far ultimately dented his competitiveness and he crossed the line in 11th; just seven seconds behind winner Francesco Bagnaia.
“All weekend we had quite good pace on race rubber but in qualifying we kept trying to make a competitive lap-time to be a bit further up. I had a really good start today but unfortunately in Turn 5 I had a bit of contact and lost five positions. It put me off the back of the front group and although I caught up again I made a massive mistake with my tyre choice.
I paid for it because I had a large drop in the last laps. Sorry to my team because we could have definitely done something good today. A big learning experience for us,” said Brad.
Brad moved down one place from 6th in July to 7th out of 27 riders in the championship standing while team mate Miguel is 10th. The next race in the series the CryptoDATA Motorrad Grand Prix von Österreich at Spielberg, Austria on August 21.
