Troublesome Friday for Barbera in Valencia

Avintia Racing Ducati’s Hector Barbera ended the first day of practice at his home race down in 13^th after troublesome time in the afternoon session.

The Spaniard has been looking forward to this race all season, citing it has his ‘most anticipated race’ of the year. The day started off positively for Barbera. After the first 45 minutes of running he was 11^th on the time sheets on a 1m32.285, and this was just a couple of hundredths outside of factory Ducati rider Andrea Iannone’s lap in 10^th.

Feeling positive about improving in the afternoon, Barbera’s day took a rather frustrating turn. The Avintia rider spent some of his time trying the harder option tyres, and found that he didn’t like them at all. He reverted back to the softer compound and managed to improve his feeling on the Desmosedici GP14.2.

When he headed out in the closing stages to put in a qualifying simulation, he encountered an issue with his front brake and this forced him back into pit lane. He switched machine but was left lacking in confidence, and this meant that he could only manage 13^th with a 1m31.742s.

Despite his woes, Barbera is still enjoying riding in front of his home crowd and is keen to put on a good show, though this won’t be an easy task. The GP14.2 is not best suited to the Ricardo Tormo Circuit, something Barbera has eluded to, but that won’t stop him trying his best for a place in QP2 tomorrow.

“It was a strange first day. In the morning it was okay, but this afternoon we used the hard front tyre in the beginning and I don’t like it,” said Barbera.

“We improved with the softer tyre, but when we got a new set of tyres for attack I had an issue with the front brake. Then I got back on track but my confidence was not the best. I’m really happy of racing at home, the track is fantastic for the fans and also for the riders, because you can feel how close they are. This is a very anticipated race and a very special one, and that is why the sold out from three months ago. We will give our best to get into Q2 tomorrow. This is not the best track for our bike, but we will give our 100%.”