Losing rear grip causing problems again at Motegi

Mika Kallio's Marc VDS teammate Tito Rabat extended his championship lead to 38 points over Kallio, with a hard fought third place in the Japanese Moto2 Grand Prix at Motegi. Kallio was strong at the start of the race but a loss of rear grip saw him drop back to finish fifth.

The two Marc VDS riders were involved in a titanic battle with Johan Zarco and Maverick Viñales for third place in the opening stages of today’s race, which allowed eventual race winner Tom Lüthi to build up an unassailable lead at the front.

Rabat managed to battle his way through into third, as rear grip problems saw Kallio unable to match the pace of this teammate, with the Finn eventually dropping back to be caught and passed by Zarco for fourth at two-thirds race distance.

Mika Kallio // 5th
“I’ve not much to say really. The same thing happened today as in the last few races, where seven or eight laps into the race I could feel I was losing rear grip and accelerating out of the turns wasn’t so easy. Step by step it got worse, as did the lap time, which meant I couldn’t stay with the group. With a full tank I felt really good on the brakes and could attack in the first laps, but when the bike gets lighter then it starts to get complicated. It’s strange that we’ve had this problem only in the last few races when we were winning before that. We need to think about what we can do, because we need to finish the season as strongly as we started it.”

Michael Bartholemy // Team Principal
“The rear grip problem that Mika has had the last few races is something for which we need to find a solution, and fast. That will be our focus in Australia next weekend.”

Photo: Gold and Goose Photography

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