Despite the Red Bull KTM riders efforts on Friday and Saturday, Jack Miller and Brad Binder occupied the 11th and 22nd on the starting grid. It was surprisingly overcast conditions in Le Mans for round five of the 2024 MotoGP season.
With 27 laps of the famous Circuit de la Sarthe, Jack and Brad both launched of the start and made lively getaways. After the first two laps, Jack had maintained his 11th placed starting position, in close pursuit of the top ten.
Meanwhile, Brad Binder had made tremendous early progress having risen from the back of the grid up to 13th position. By the following lap, young starlet Pedro Acosta was the fastest man on track before he made an ambitious lunge up the inside of Turn 8 and crashed out of the race. This momentarily promoted Jack into the top ten, before losing a out to Miguel Oliveira. It was then the two KTM riders running one behind the other as the pushed to take positions in the top ten.
Marco Bezzecchi soon crashed out too at Turn 6, and Jack regained tenth position. Binder now up to 11th. The pair exchanged places before Franco Morbidelli overtook Jack to demote him the 12th with 20 laps to go. The pair settled into their positions, managing their tyres for the latter stages of the race.
It was with 10 laps to go when Jack, running in 12th position, was making pace on the edge of the top ten until he was caught-out with a front-end. By that point Brad had made a rasping flight from the last row and up to the fringe of the top eight. Binder had already passed nine riders on the first lap but then concentrated on grabbing as many points as possible.
With one lap left to go, Brad made the final lunge to take home 8th place from Aleix Espargaró. Following that result, Brad sits 7th in the Championship standings, while Jack sits in 13th.
Another difficult weekend, Francesco Guidotti, Red Bull KTM Factory Racing Team Manager, said: “We knew that starting from the back would not be easy for Brad but he did a great job and went from 22 to 8. I think that was the maximum we could do today so we have to somehow be happy with it after what happened the previous two days.
“We know qualifying is the key to the weekend but we missed it this time and paid the bill. Jack suddenly crashed out of 11th and he had not made a mistake. Maybe it was the increased wind this afternoon. We have a bit of time to rest and check the data now. We will go to Barcelona knowing we have much more potential.”
A hard-fought battle from the back of the grid to come home in 8th place, Brad Binder said: “I got a really good start today but I wanted more from the race because I could see 6th place right in front of me. Anyway, we came from a long way back so I cannot complain.
“We made a really big step from yesterday’s Sprint race to today: I felt a lot better, more confident and was able to ride. I think we’ve got some work to do still but considering where we were on the grid we cannot be too upset today.”
After an impressive start, Jack Miller said: “We are trying our maximum week-in, week-out and our pace over the weekend was good, especially on used tires but in the Sprint and main race I struggled with rear grip.
“The crash was really strange because I was only 1kmph faster than I’d been on the previous lap and certainly not the fastest I’d been there during the whole race. It’s a head-scratcher. A disappointing end to the weekend but we will not stop working.”
The next stop on the MotoGP calendar takes the teams and riders back to Spain for Barcelona.