Strong Qualifying for GRT Yamaha in Indonesia, Race 1 Postponed due to Rain

20-11-2021

Strong Qualifying for GRT Yamaha in Indonesia, Race 1 Postponed due to Rain

GRT Yamaha WorldSBK Team’s Garrett Gerloff will start tomorrow’s races from fourth on the grid, with heavy rain seeing the first-ever FIM Superbike World Championship race at the Mandalika International Street Circuit postponed until Sunday.

The day had begun in a promising way, with Gerloff yet again scoring the third-fastest time in Free Practice 3. The American then enjoyed a solid Tissot Superpole session (1'33.545), which ensures he will start both feature length races from fourth on the grid.

After enjoying a positive Friday, Gerloff’s teammate Kohta Nozane continued working on the setup of his Yamaha R1 during this morning’s FP3 session, in which he clocked in the 18th-fastest time. In the Superpole, he improved, and the Japanese rider will start 16th in both races tomorrow thanks to a 1'34.660.

Given the postponement of Race 1, tomorrow’s schedule has been changed. After the usual 09:00 Warm Up, the first race commences at 11:00 and the second at 15:00, local time (GMT+8), whereas the Tissot Superpole Race will not take place.

For Superpole results, click here.

Garrett Gerloff: Superpole – P4 (1'33.545)

GRT Yamaha WorldSBK Team

Superpole went pretty well today. I was quite happy to qualify in the first two rows, and that was also thanks to a bit of a different strategy that we chose to try to keep my rhythm up. It seemed to work, so that was positive. Then, just when we were about to get ready for the start of the race, some really dark clouds came over the track and, as soon as I left the pits for the sighting lap, it started pouring down like crazy. There was so much water that the start had to be delayed, and in the end they decided to cancel the race. No problem, I am happy to run both long races tomorrow. It will be difficult because of the heat and the humidity, but I am from Texas, and we have a lot of heat and humidity there too. I am pretty used to it, so I will do the best that I can.

Kohta Nozane: Superpole – P16 (1'34.660)

GRT Yamaha WorldSBK Team

My qualifying was not good, because I wasn’t as fast as I would have liked to be on the single lap. I think I could have qualified as high as 11th, but in the end I was only 16th. I usually like rain conditions, but today it rained way too much to have a safe Race 1. Tomorrow we will have two long races and they will for sure be very hard. I will do my best.