Red Bull KTM Ajo rider arrives at home round with will to win and cut points gap to the leader in the Moto3 standings. Karel Hanika hopes to debut with a good result at the Australian track –just as he did in Japan.

The flyaway tour continues for the Red Bull KTM Ajo team after the first stop in Japan, with the Moto3 series moving on to Australia. It will be a special weekend for Jack Miller, who hopes the support of his fans can help him regain ground in the overall standings in which he is second. His teammate, Karel Hanika, was twelfth in Japan and hopes to adapt quickly to a very unique track where he has not raced before –just as he did last weekend at Motegi.

This will be the sixth race Jack Miller has participated in at Phillip Island. The Australian, ruing his mistake on the last lap of the Japanese Grand Prix, hopes to return to the podium and win at one of his favourite circuits. Miller claims not to feel any pressure, but instead feels more comfortable racing in front of the home fans and hopes that good work done recently in practice is rewarded on race day. His best finish at the track came last year with a fifth place, from tenth on the grid. The weather and wind will, according to Miller, prove decisive for the outcome of the race.

With only computer games and videos from previous years to guide him beforehand, Karel Hanika will try to repeat and/or improve on his result from Motegi at Phillip Island. Different from the rest of the Moto3 World Championship tracks, it is very fast, open and technical. Three races before the end of the season, the Czech rookie ranks eighteenth in the overall standings with a total of 28 points.

The Grand Prix weekend has some small schedule changes this time out. Practice for the Australian GP begins on Friday at 10am local time, with qualifying on Saturday at 1:35pm and the race itself on Sunday at 1pm.

Circuit information – Phillip Island
Length: 4.448m / 2.764 miles
Width: 13m
Left corners: 7
Right corners: 5
Longest straight: 900m / 0.559 miles
Constructed: 1956
Modified: 1988

Jack Miller

“The way the championship is going, I could not be happier to go to Australia now, as it is my home track. We’ll have a very busy week, but I can’t wait to see my fans and my friends. We have a clear objective, which is to win and cut the points gap. Phillip Island is a difficult track where I have obtained quite irregular results. We’ll see how it goes but I can’t wait to start working and have a good weekend.”

Karel Hanika

“I can’t wait to have another great experience of learning a new track for me. The weekend in Japan went very well, and I hope the same will happen in Australia. The Phillip Island circuit I only know from the videogames, but it looks nice. Everybody speaks highly of it, so I’m anxious to put in my first lap there. I’ll ask for advice from Joan Olive, my sports consultant within the team, because he was very fast in Australia and I also hope to be so.”