Aegerter (9th) wants more, Mulhauser progresses
The whole Swiss Moto2 team will remember this week of April 2016 for a long time: The technicians of Thomas Lüthi (Garage Plus Interwetten), Dominique Aegerter and Robin Mulhauser (carXpert Interwetten) spent more than 70 hours travelling to Texas from the north of Argentina due to serious problems with the tour operator, who was in charge of their travel. Having arrived in the paddock of COTA (Circuit of the Americas) on Thursday morning, they were set to work immediately, building the box and preparing the machines. The mission was perfectly accomplished, stressed Frédéric Corminboeuf, the boss: "Our first two riders finished the first day in Top-10, eight and ninth respectively. Everything was safe and without a problem, I have to say huge hats off to my guys as they did not get a lot of sleep and they gave it everything to make everything work. Focusing on the riders, Tom is far from where he wants to be, although he set his personal best lap time of this Austin circuit. However, we have to keep our eyes open: we still need more speed; we have another free practice session and qualifying on Saturday afternoon to find a solution. I am a bit less worried about Dominique because we know that he is always very capable in the race to stay with the best; he also needs to reduce that gap of 9 tenths that he is losing, if he wants to get a podium like two years ago on this circuit that he loves and that suits him well. Robin showed some interesting things today; it still did not translate into results on the time sheet but he gathered some important information that he now has to absorb."
They said...
Dominique Aegerter (carXpert Interwetten, 9th) "We are there, I managed to do the lap that placed me in Top-10 quite quickly but the gap is too much. We know that Rins is very fast on this circuit but if I want to fight for the podium I really need to reduce this gap on Saturday. The bike is still not what I want and we are working a lot with the whole team to find a solution. Other than that, we tried the two different tires, the temperature changed between this morning and the afternoon and, in short, it was a busy day. Being in the Top-10 from the opening free practice is important but I need to stay there if I want to keep up with the leaders during the race."
Robin Mulhauser (carXpert Interwetten, 26th) "I have already set a better lap time than last year and more importantly, for the first time this season I was able to give my team a lot of information. We tested the two tires that we have at our disposal and although the result - 26th position - does not tell you anything, I know that we have worked for our future. The immediate future, because now we have to analyse all this information to make a step forward tomorrow in qualifying. I love this track, I really enjoy riding here. I did 34 laps without any physical discomfort."
