Alvaro Bautista compromised by tyre choice in Dutch WorldSBK practice

Alvaro Bautista ended FP2 fifth-fastest at the Dutch WorldSBK and almost half-a-second behind his teammate: Nicolo Bulega. But the Spaniard was positive at the end of the day, in any case, blaming his afternoon speed on poor tyre choice.

The two-time World Superbike Champion had been fastest in FP1, when, he said, he got his tyre choice right.

“I think it has been positive because this morning straight away I felt good on the bike,” Bautista told WorldSBK.com at the close of Friday in Assen.

“I was using I think the right tyres as well, because I think in FP1 it’s the first time I’ve used the SC1 on the front – normally I use SC2, but in the morning with the cold conditions we preferred to start with the ‘right tyre’, not like in other races.

“So, straight away I had a good feeling, also with the new rear [tyre] from Pirelli I felt quite good. So, the feeling was there, I was able to enjoy riding, I did some slides around the track and I had a lot of fun.”

While he’d made the right choices on tyres in the morning, Bautista felt his combinations of front and rear compounds in FP2 compromised his running; although he ultimately felt that his feeling with the Panigale V4 R was positive.

“This afternoon we started with the harder compound on the front and the new [tyre] on the rear, and on the rear it was good but on the front I had not the same feedback – even if we went faster than in the morning, but the feeling wasn’t the best,” he said.

“At the end of the practice we compared both the front and rear, so we put the softer [tyre] on the front and finally I felt much better; but the problem is that I had the wrong tyre at the rear.

“So, in the afternoon we missed [using] the right [front and rear tyres] at the same time – one time we put the right one at the front and the wrong one at the rear, and before we put the wrong on the front and the right at the rear.

“But the feeling is there, I’m really happy with the feeling I had with the bike.

“We don’t need to change a lot on the bike, so that means that we have a good base that worked in Australia, that worked in Portimao and also here with three very different tracks and the feeling is quite similar.”

Bulega: “Good” feeling but not “100% nice”

Bautista’s Aruba.it Racing Ducati teammate, Nicolo Bulega, was fastest by 0.252 seconds in FP2, but even the Italian felt that he was “struggling too much”.

“I feel good with my bike, we made an improvement from FP1 to FP2,” Bulega told WorldSBK.com.

“Honestly, it is not 100 per cent a nice feeling. We can still improve, not the lap time but my feeling, to be more comfortable on the bike. I am struggling too much.

“In general, it was a good Friday. I hope to make another improvement.

“I want to be more comfortable on the bike, and be faster.”