Milwaukee Aprilia struggled in Race 2 at Magny-Cours on Sunday, with Eugene Laverty crashing on Lap 2 and Lorenzo Savadori retiring on the last lap.
Eugene fell at Turn 16 on the second lap while locked into a fight with Sykes for P4. Exiting the corner Eugene lost the rear but was able to keep his RSV4-RF running. He continued and had a lonely race to his finishing position of P18.
There are positives for the team to take from Round 11 at Magny-Cours, including Eugene’s strong second-half surge in Race 1 and Lorenzo’s much-improved Race 2 pace, which demonstrate the big progress made with the new generation of Aprilia RSV4-RF.
The team next head to Jerez for the penultimate round of the 2017 season, as development work begins to look towards 2018.
Eugene Laverty #50 – Aprilia RSV4-RF
Grid: P3 / Race 2: P18 “The rain was coming down the whole race today but we were still pushing. It was just on the limit of not enough rain to make a difference to the conditions, but my crash on Lap 2 was a surprise. When Sykes passed me at Turn 16 I opened the throttle a little more to cover, but I lost the rear and I didn’t see it coming. I got the bike started again and continued, but it was very frustrating to go out so early after a positive race in the wet yesterday. It’s hard to say how far I could have got after a lap and a half. I was maybe a bit too tentative in some of the cold left-hand corners because of the weather, but my Sector 1 time on the first lap was second quickest so it showed we had pace we’ll never know for sure.We’ve made big strides overall this weekend, and the progress in Race 1 was the first time we managed that. There are positives to take from that and with four races left we will work to end the season in good shape.”