Race 1 postponed until tomorrow due to snow after an eventful Saturday at Assen

“I think the postponing of Race1 was 100% the right call. Even this morning it was only about 4 degrees with track temperatures of maybe four or five degrees. That meant that even in the dry it was pretty sketchy, and we saw Cortese having a big high side in qualifying and Kiyo also crashing out. Maybe if it had been perfectly dry we could have raced, because the Pirelli tyres are behaving really well in cold temperatures. But nothing could have worked in the conditions we had today, and with the track even just a little wet, it would be really impossible to ride safely. In a situation like that, as soon as you touch the kerb or something, you don’t get a second chance. So, from the riders’ point of view it was really not safe and Dorna did a good job in taking this decision. Hopefully tomorrow we’ll be able to race and do well, because we’re feeling better with the bike here and will do our best to score a better result.”

“There is not much to say. Conditions were tricky out there today. I was pushing hard to improve my lap time towards the end of qualifying when I suffered a crash which left me badly bruised. I was not feeling great, and so even before the decision came to postpone race 1, we had already decided that I would sit out today, rest up, and try to be ready for tomorrow.”