Profile
Date of Birth: 25/05/1989
Birthplace: Spain
Height/Weight: 178cm・63kg
Team (Machine): Estrella Galicia 0,0 Marc VDS (RC213V)
Results of 2016: 21st MotoGP World Championship
Round 14 of the 2017 campaign, the Aragon Grand Prix was the third home race for Spaniard rider Tito Rabat. Although Team Estrella Galicia 0,0 Marc VDS’ rider had scored championship points at almost every race in the first part of the season, he struggled for satisfactory results in the second half. Rabat gradually regained his momentum; In the British Grand Prix, he made a strong comeback from Row 7 to finish 12th place. At the San Marino Grand Prix, he started the weekend within the top10 and clocked 12th fastest in Free Practice 3. Unfortunately, the race saw very tricky conditions and Rabat crashed. With all these reasons, Rabat needed a good result on home turf at Motorland Aragon.
“I head to Aragon motivated to put in a good performance in front of my home crowd. I like the track a lot and I think with the improvements we’ve made recently with the set up we will start free practice with a good base,” the Spaniard was confident for the weekend. “We took a big step in Silverstone, confirmed the changes in Misano and now we need to take the next step this weekend in Aragon. Of course, this is very much dependent on the weather, which looks to be a bit unpredictable, but we will see.”
Friday’s weather was indeed unpredictable. Rabat set the 16th quickest lap time in Free Practice 1, and in the afternoon, successfully improved his lap time by 1.281 seconds, which earned him 22nd place on the combined time sheets.
“Today the conditions were very difficult and it is never easy to understand how much you can push when the track is half wet and half dry. I was just working on improving my confidence without taking any big risks and the plan worked out well,” said Rabat, recalling the day in a positive mood. “I don’t really like it so much when the conditions are like this, especially when it looks like the race is going to be run in the dry. I still had some fun, even though it was not possible to go any faster. We will see what tomorrow brings but I hope we get some stable weather because today we lost a day to focus on the race setting.”
Saturday’s sessions were dry, and Rabat showed consistent pace in Free Practice 3. He set the 8th quickest lap time with 20 minutes to go, and concluded the session in 14th position. In the afternoon, he lost some feel with the front, and sank to 21st in Qualifying.
“To be honest I was expecting a little bit more from qualifying after my performance in FP3 but I didn’t have the perfect feeling with the front-end with lack of time to test the tires on a dry track. But I came back strong at the end of the qualifying session with a good time despite a small crash in FP4. But I have a good feeling for the race and if the weather is like today we have a clearer idea now for our tire choice.”
In the 23 lap race, Rabat demonstrated his resilience, chasing down competitors from a difficult 21st grid. He steadily moved up the field from the start, and after the halfway mark, contested close battles. In the end, he crossed the finish line in 15th place to score a single championship point, thanks to the enthusiastic support from his home crowd.
Now that the 2017 MotoGP championship heads to the final stages of ‘fly-away’ three successive races, starting from Honda Motor Company’s home race, the Japanese Grand Prix, then followed to Australia and Malaysia.
The 2017 MotoGP championship heads to three fly-away races starting at Honda’s home race, the Japanese Grand Prix, followed by Australia and Malaysia.
Original Source[ HONDA World ]