Jack Miller guides Karel Hanika around the Losail circuit during the third and final free practice session for the Grand Prix of Qatar.

The Losail circuit hosted a single Moto3 session this afternoon, with the last Free Practice of the weekend. Red Bull KTM Ajo riders Jack Miller and Karel Hanika continued to work on the development of their KTM machines, setting the fourth and  ninth fastest times of the day, respectively, and improving on their best laps from yesterday. Both riders rode alongside one another for much of the session, allowing Hanika to learn firsthand the tricks of the track.

The Moto3 riders were hard at work for 40 minutes. Although placed at the head of the timesheets in the early going, Jack Miller would not improve his time from Thursday until the second half of the session -as did teammate Karel Hanika. The latter followed his teammate for several laps of an unfamiliar track and was helped considerably by the guidance. The rookie lowered his top time from the previous night by more than 1 second -2:06.631- whilst the Australian shaved almost almost two tenths off his with a 2:06.280.

The first key battle of the Moto3 World Championship season will be contested tomorrow with the qualifying session at 6pm local time. The best grid position achieved by Jack Miller at this circuit was taken last year, with a seventh row start.

Results – FP3
1. Romano Fenati (KTM) 2:06.121
2. Alex Rins (Honda) 2:06.182 +0.061
3. Alex Marquez (Honda) 2:06.273 +0.152
4. Jack Miller (Red Bull KTM Ajo) 2:06.280 +0.159
5. Jakub Kornfeil (KTM) 2:06.323 +0.202
9. Karel Hanika (Red Bull KTM Ajo) 2:06.631 +0.510

Results (Combined practice time FP1-FP2-FP3)
1. Romano Fenati (KTM) 2:06.121
2. Alex Rins (Honda) 2:06.182 +0.061
3. Jakub Kornfeil (KTM) 2:06.190 +0.069
4. Alex Marquez (Honda) 2:06.273 +0.152
5. Jack Miller (Red Bull KTM Ajo) 2:06.280 +0.159
10. Karel Hanika (Red Bull KTM Ajo) 2:06.631 +0.510

 Jack Miller >> Audio
“It was a good day. I’m much happier than I was yesterday. Whenever I’m more comfortable with the bike, we are setting consistent laps. I am very satisfied with the work done, because even with used tyres the feeling is still great. We only put new rubber on for the final two laps and it was fine. We need to work a little more on the front grip to stabilise the bike a little more, but I am confident with the bike we have now and I think that we can do a good job. The last two laps were pretty good, although we could have been faster had I not made a couple of small mistakes. I’m also very happy with the first, second and fourth sectors; on the third sector we have to adjust a little more, but in general things are positive.”

Karel Hanika >> Audio
“Today was another good practice session. We worked a lot with different configurations for the bike. First we improved the feeling with used tyres and, later, with new tyres, we were even better. I believe that tomorrow we can still take things a step further. I’d like to thank Jack [Miller] for the help he gave me on the track today.”

*Audio solely for radio use