Andrea Iannone (Team Pata Go Eleven) has returned from his injury suffered last round at Most just 10 days ago in order to ride for his team and make progress with their Ducati Panigale V4 R package. ‘The Maniac’ is fighting through the discomfort using a modified brake setup and a larger right boot to accommodate the injury, but at this important juncture of the season, the #29 is willing to forego comfort to get his season back on track. He finished the session in P16 and laid down a considerable 66 laps.

BITING THE BULLET: “I’m for sure not feeling 100%, but it’s important to come back and regain the feeling. At the end, I think it was a positive day for my physical condition.”

After his FP1 injury from Most, the Italian Sophomore WorldSBK rider was diagnosed with fractures in his third and fourth toes on his right foot. The injury prevented him from racing at Most, and while his participation at Misano’s Test days was questioned, just 10 days after the injury, Iannone is here to try to improve his package.

“I’m for sure not feeling 100%, but it’s important to come back and regain the feeling." said Iannone "At the end I think it was a positive day for my physical condition. I was able to do many laps, with a lot of pain, but in the end, we made the most of it. The injury was only 10 days ago, so I have to be careful not to stress it too much. The feeling is not bad, but the speed is not good. We have many things to do to improve, at the braking point I don’t have a good feeling with the engine brake, so I lose a lot of speed, especially on the faster parts of the track."

“Now with the injury, we are trying to adjust the rear brake… we struggled today, but I hope tomorrow I will become more familiar” – Iannone on his new rear brake setup

Iannone’s season started hot with a pair of podiums at Phillip Island, but since then, there have not been many positive results for the #29. He earned a P4 at Cremona’s Race 1, doing well to hold off Vierge, however, a three-race DNF streak has seen him drop to P8 in the Riders’ Championship standings. Part of this to Iannone, has been his braking, which is one of his main priorities to fix ahead of the Pirelli Emilia-Romagna Round.

“All year, I’ve struggled with the brakes, the engine brake, the rear brake, and we’ve tried everything." said Iannone "So now with the injury, we are trying to adjust the rear brake to be up by the steering, it’s not bad, but in any case, we struggled today with that solution, but I hope that tomorrow I will become more familiar with it.”

Iannone will look to finish on the podium at Misano, June 13-15^th, tune in live via the WorldSBK VideoPass! Now 30% off!