MotoGP Mandalika: ‘Work to do’ for Dixon but ‘felt incredible’

Inde Aspar’s Jake Dixon was true to his word on Friday after learning the new Mandalika Circuit quickly to dominate the Moto2 times.

Concluding the opening day’s two free practice sessions almost half a second faster than the intermediate field in the combined times, thanks to a 1’35.897 set on his 15th of 17 laps in the afternoon’s FP2, Dixon was both confident and calm about his weekend approach.

Despite the morning’s tricky conditions, due to heavy rain and a dirty surface, the Brit got to grips with the 4.3kms Lombok layout quickly. Running in the top five on wet tyres in FP1, he was soon up to speed in the more favourable afternoon session before setting two rapid laps in quick succession to dominate overall on the GasGas Kalex machine. Whilst his Friday form was impressive, the 26-year-old is far from resting on his laurels and eager to get back to work in preparation for Saturday’s qualifying.

“Good first day,” Dixon reflected from the Indonesian paddock. “The track is amazing, the layout suits my style, I like fast corners. The bike is also amazing, I can’t say enough about it.

“When you have a bike underneath you, you can really show your potential. The team allows me to do that. I think that as the season goes on, we will be really strong.

“Today I felt incredible, but we need to keep working: I’m fast today, but we need to continue like this tomorrow and on Sunday. I still have some work to do on myself, I feel like there are some areas where I can improve, but, for day one, I’m really happy.”