Brad Binder: Team thought I had a problem I was going off so often...

"I think my team thought there was something wrong so they put ‘box, box’ on my dashboard..." - off-track moments and eventually a high-side scupper Brad Binder's progress in France
Brad Binder French MotoGP. 9 October 2020
Brad Binder French MotoGP. 9 October 2020
© Gold and Goose Photography

Brad Binder has described his first ❀outing around the Le Mans Bugatti circuit on a MotoGP bike as a ‘day to forget’ after struggling to find his balance in evolving conditions during fr꧅ee practice for the French MotoGP.

The Czech ꦏMotoGP race winner has seen the momentum from that spectacular maiden win𒉰 stall in recent rounds, the South African freely admitting he sometimes takes time to build up his rhythm riding a new circuit before pushing on in the latter stages of the weekend.

Even so, he has ground to make up o🎶n Saturday morning after finishing FP1 an♕d FP2 16th and 22nd respectively, Binder revealing his form was so bad in the afternoon that his team brought him into the box assuming he had a problem after repeated off-track moments in the damp.

His day would end prematurely shortly afterward♕s with a crash at Turn 7, Binder failing to set a representative lap time.

“Fantas🤡tic day to𝔉day, to say the least,” Binder joked.

“This mor💎ning was quite OK, this afternoon I was happy to see it was drier but I went off track every lap for five or six laps, then I think my team thought there was something wrong so they put ‘box, box’ on my dashboard, so I pitted. 

“They asked ‘what’s wrong?’ but there was nothing w🎐rong, just spending mo🗹re time on the side of the track than on it. Went out of the pits, don’t know if I hit a wet patch but I crashed at Turn 7 on my first flying lap. First session I haven’t made a single lap count.

“The entries were really good but the biggest thing was the exit of the corners because I wasn’t sure how much throttle I could get because you’re going over square patches the whole time. That makes it more difficult to figure out where you can open the gap💙s but I think I went straight most laps.

“In the full wet it’s quite cool but when it’s patchy it is hard to when to commit to when you want to brake and when you want to turn. You know you caಌn do it, but you’re not too sure if you go over these patches. You might just tuck, wobble and then you’ll be fine. Tod🌠ay is a day to forget and we start again tomorrow.”

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