Jonas Folger and his Bonovo Action / MGM Racing Performance crew worked through an extensive agenda on Friday.
The setbacks of the World Championship’s previous meeting in Estoril two weeks ago did not dampen the spirits of the Superbike newcomers from Germany. Highly motivated, the ambitious team travelled this week to the third stop of the series at the Misano World Circuit close to Italy’s Adriatic coast.
During first free practice session on Friday morning, different geometry settings were evaluated to the still all-new BMW M 1000 RR to get a comparison with the ones used so far. After these trails, however, it was decided to go back to a more familiar setting. With this step Jonas Folger was able to improve in the afternoon in summer conditions by almost half a second. With a personal best of 1’36.010, he was just 1.6 seconds off the pace and finished 16th overall after the first day of practice.
#94 Jonas FOLGER (Bonovo Action / MGM Racing Performance, BMW M 1000 RR)
FP1: P16 - 1´36.409 / FP2: P16 - 1´36.010:
“It was a busy start to the weekend. Initially, we tried a different setting in FP1. We had a look to the factory team’s data and copied some settings from them to see if that would be a viable solution for us. Unfortunately, that was not working in the end. So, we went back to the Estoril setting till the second practice got underway. I got on a bit better with that and my lap times became faster, even though the temperatures were much warmer. After this change, my confidence was greater again to be able to shift more quickly in the fast changes of direction and to go more into lean angles.”
“We also made some adjustments to the electronics and tested some new tyres from Pirelli to get a first impression. We have not yet made the big leap we had hoped for, but at least it was a step in the right direction. Therefore, we are satisfied with what we have achieved today, although things could still go better, of course. Now we are collecting ideas and hope that we can improve again tomorrow.”
#ITAWorldSBK - Combined Free Practice Times (FP1/FP2):
1 Michael Ruben RINALDI / ITA / Aruba.it Racing - Ducati / Ducati Panigale V4 R / 1´34.334 (FP2)
2 Alex LOWES / GBR / Kawasaki Racing Team WorldSBK / Kawasaki ZX-10R / 1´34.628 +0.294 (FP2)
3 Toprak RAZGATLIOGLU / TUR / Pata Yamaha with BRIXX WorldSBK / Yamaha YZF R1 / 1´34.848 +0.514 (FP1)
16 #94 Jonas FOLGER / GER / Bonovo Action MGM Racing Performance / BMW M 1000 RR / 1´36.010 +1.676 (FP2)
#ITAWorldSBK – Time Schedule for Saturday June 12th (CET):
09:00 - 09:30 FP3
11:10 - 11:25 Superpole
14:00 Race 1 (21 Laps - 88.746 km)
