The Correos Prepago Yamaha VR46 Master Camp team jumped back into action at the Autódromo Internacional do Algarve today and started the Grande Prémio de Portugal with positive results. Manuel Gonzalez was well in the mix with the top contenders in both the morning and the afternoon practice session. He ended the day in 7th place. Despite losing some track time due to rain in P1, new recruit Kohta Nozane gained experience. He found a good time improvement in P2 and finished his first official Moto2 riding day in 27th position.
Gonzalez, though feeling ill, showed his confidence in the first session of the 2023 season. After a successful Jerez private test and Portimao official test, the Spanish talent was ready to start fighting for podium results. He made good on his promise in the sunny conditions at the start of P1. He set a 1'43.225s on lap 5/7, that put him in third position. With sudden rain falling 17 minutes into the session, no further track action took place in the morning from the Correos Prepago Yamaha VR46 Master Camp squad.
Manugasss kept the good momentum going in the dry afternoon session. He only needed five laps to clock a 1‘42.825s and then moved on to further improving his bike‘s settings. The lap time was fast enough to earn him seventh in the P2 and the combined P1 + P2 rankings, well within the provisional top-14 that promote to Q2.
Nozane‘s mission for P1 was to gain as much experience on the Moto2 bike as possible. He started his first practice in the bright sunshine and was working on building speed when midway through the session rain flags came out. The Japanese rider didn‘t risk heading back out in tricky conditions. He ended the morning in 26th place, with a 1'45.425s best time, set on lap 9/10.
The glorious Portuguese sunshine was warmly welcomed by the rookie rider in the afternoon. He put in 17 laps and managed to shave more than 0.4s off his previous best in the 40 minutes of dry track time. His 1‘45.008s, set on lap 15/17, put him in 27th place in the P2 and the combined session timesheets.
