Lecuona fourth in the Superpole race, Vierge sixth in WorldSBK Race 2 at Barcelona

“We changed something on the front of the bike in warm-up, adjusting things after a little issue we had yesterday, but I still felt I was missing something during the Superpole race. Having said that, thanks to those drops of rain I realised it was time to try and take a chance. I had a good battle with different riders and then Locatelli in the last lap and only just missed out on the podium. So P4 in the end, but I was pleased with that, and also with my grid position for race 2. My feeling with the bike was completely different in race 2 to be honest, and from lap eight onwards I found myself struggling with the tyres and realised I couldn’t do any better. Anyway, it is what it is, and we must now check all the data and understand why this was the case today, because the weekend was actually positive overall. I think the team did a good job, so it was a pity we didn’t better exploit our potential at this track. I’m a little frustrated with how today went, but I think we are on the way and will now focus on next week’s test where we hope to keep improving.”

“I think we reacted in the best way possible following what was a demanding start to the weekend, our performance on Sunday better than Saturday. I need to thank the team because they never give up, just like me. We always work hard over the week to understand which way to go. We made good progress and grew a lot during the weekend to finish race two a solid six. So I’m happy about that and also because we made some changes to the bike setup that gave me much more feeling. That was a positive, also because we’ve understood more about the set-up and this could help in the next races. Of course, Catalunya is a track where you really have to consider tyre wear, so when I saw the fight for the podium not far ahead with 10 laps to go, I pushed a bit more than necessary but immediately felt the drop in tyres. So despite my heart telling me to go for it, I kept my cool and maintained the fastest possible pace in the circumstances. On the last lap I took my chances in passing Locatelli and we collected some good points. Our bike has some very strong points - it’s a rocket and that’s good at tracks with a long straight, like Aragon for example, but we cannot profit from this through the corners or on short straights so at the moment our window is a little tight, but we are all focused on improving across every area and we’ll keep giving 100% to get where we want to be.”