Quartararo: Arm feels good, we didn’t get to push on softs

Fabio Quartararo has reflected on his Friday practice at Sachsenring positively despite concerns over his forearm injury and a late FP2 incident which denied him a clean quick laps on the soft tyres.

After topping FP1, the Petronas Yamaha rider was edged down to third place on the combined times in the afternoon session as he missed out on a clear soft tyre run at the end of FP2 after being blocked by team-mate Franco Morbidelli in the closing minutes of the session.

Despite appearing visibly frustrated at being held up by both his team-mate and other riders during his soft tyre run, Quartararo still felt overall it was a strong opening day at Sachsenring having been a consistent front-runner on all tyre compounds.

“It was a positive day for us, because we were able to try all the tyre compounds and we’re good with all of them,” Quartararo said. “We didn’t really push for a lap time with the soft tyre, but we know we’re really strong with the medium and hard.

“My flying lap was a little bit interrupted, but I’m still very happy because although it’s not one of my favourite tracks, we’re feeling strong.”

Having confirmed he would assess his own physical condition after FP1 due to the forearm pain he suffered at Assen following his recent arm pump surgery, Quartararo says he doesn’t feel badly hit by the problem thanks to Sachsenring’s circuit layout.

Quartararo has been suffering with his right forearm but with 11 out of 14 corners at the German track left-handers he feels the track requires less demand on his injury.

“My arm is feeling good. It’s a special track with so many left-hand corners, so for my physical condition, it’s one of the most favourable configurations,” he said.

Quartararo, fresh off the back of consecutive pole positions and podium results, ended Friday practice in third place and 0.360s off timesheet-topper Marc Marquez.