Red Bull KTM Ajo riders Niccolo Antonelli and Bo Bendsneyder complete a positive night at Losail, improving in every session and placing in the Top 15 overall.

Bad weather on Friday led to race direction suspending the last two Moto3 sessions on the opening night of official testing in Qatar. Thus, Niccolo Antonelli and Bo Bendsneyder could only put in 3 laps at the end of the first hour. Fortunately, the young Red Bull KTM Ajo riders were able to make up for lost time on Saturday in three productive hours of testing, placing eighth and thirteenth place, respectively, on the combined timesheet.

Step by step and lap by lap, Antonelli and Bendsnedyer found a good feeling onboard their KTM bikes. After 6 consecutive days of testing at Jerez, today they were able to work in a new track. Both improved their times session after session, setting their best laps during the night run and climbing positions on the timesheets. The Italian, fifth in the last session, set a best time of 2:07.150, only two tenths faster than Bendsneyder -2:07.339, tenth.

Preparations for the Qatar GP next week will continue tomorrow, with the last night of training.

Results – Combined Standings Day 2
1. Romano Fenati (Honda) 2:06.690
2. Jorge Martin (Honda) 2:06.729 +0.039
3. Aaron Canet (Honda) 2:06.749 +0.059
4. Gabriel Rodrigo (KTM) 2:06.957 +0.267
5. Livio Loi (Honda) 2:2:07.068 +0.378
8. Niccolo Antonelli (Red Bull KTM Ajo) 2:07.150 +0.460
13. Bo Bendsnedyer (Red Bull KTM Ajo) 2:07.339 +0.649

#23 Niccolo Antonelli
“Today went even better than the last day at Jerez, where made a significant improvement. I still need to feel a bit more comfortable with the front end, but I’m not worried -we have time to continue working and I’m sure we will solve it. The feeling is good and, above all, I’m happy because we have continued to improve from where we left off at Jerez. Seeing that the results are starting to come through for me is the most important thing, because I’m trying to change aspects of my riding style and this means that I’m on the right track. I want to finish off this work.”

#64 Bo Bendsneyder
“The start of the evening at Losail was quite difficult, because at first I was not comfortable with my riding and then the setup we had was not perfect for this track. However, that was only at the beginning, because from that moment on both I and the bike improved. In the last stint we took a bigger step forward. I’m happy with the work we’ve done, but we still have one more night in which to continue moving forward and going faster.”