Factory Ducati rider Francesco Bagnaia said he felt “calm” throughout second practice for the Australian Grand Prix despite spending most of the incident-filled hour in apparent danger of missing out on a place in Q2.
After an early technical problem forced him to switch bikes as dark clouds threatened to drench the Phillip Island track at any moment, Bagnaia was then interrupted by a red flag.
This meant a third of the session was gone before Bagnaia began to set representative lap times. He then scraped into the top 10, but was subsequently bumped out of it twice. He finally set a time good enough for fifth just before yellow flags came out with three minutes to go.
While Bagnaia’s championship rival Jorge Martin (Pramac Ducati) had similar woes early on following a crash at the start of the session, the points leader appeared to get up to speed and secure his Q2 spot much faster than the reigning world champion.
But what looked like a worrying situation from the outside was nothing of the sort, according to Bagnaia.
“I had a little issue with the first bike so I had to change to the other one,” explained Bagnaia. “But then everything was fine: we understood very quickly what to do on the bike.
“I saw that Jorge crashed when I was [also] having problems. I thought ‘okay, if I am out of Q2 because of the rain, then it will be the same for him’. So I did a very calm session.”
Bagnaia suggested that his late lap did not represent the limit of his performance, as the yellows caused by Aprilia wildcard Lorenzo Salvadori at Doohan meant he couldn’t show his best with another lap.
“I never felt problems or that we were [close to missing out on Q2].
“I was improving exit by exit. The last exit I did with the used soft was very good, and then with the new soft I was just unlucky with the yellow flags.
“The first lap was very fast, but normally you improve a lot on the second lap here.
“But it was enough to be in the top 10 so I’m happy! And we already know what to do for tomorrow.”
As for Bagnaia’s relatively slow rise to the top compared to some of the field, the Italian revealed that some of this had to do with unavoidable GP24 set-up work.
“We started with the same setting as 2023 but the GP24 has less traction and more weight on the front. So we needed to change it a bit to move the balance," he said.
“It was a good thing we did it today, but it was difficult to do. It was a step that [ideally] needed more time.”
This may go some way to explaining why GP23 bikes filled the first three positions in practice, as well as why pace-setter Marc Marquez expects the latest-spec Ducatis to make a big step on Saturday.
The upbeat Bagnaia was a fan of the new track surface: “This afternoon was maybe the best conditions I ever had at Phillip Island. It was sunny, no wind, the grip was very high.
“The new asphalt is very good, apart from the bumps!”
