Jack Miller says the Pramac team “pulled the bike apart” during Q1 in order to improve his Ducati under braking, which allowed him to put on a charge for pole in MotoGP qualifying at Motegi.
The Australian complained on Friday of being unable to keep the rear of his Ducati on the ground while in Motegi's hard braking zones, and says the issue persisted through Saturday morning.
Miller says the team “pulled the bike apart” while Q1 was in progress, and found a “good setting” for qualifying, which he ultimately used to snatch provisional pole with a 1:44.727s in the closing stages.
However, he crashed on his final lap, which he blamed on being “overly excited” into Turn 5, and was demoted to third.
“Yeah, yesterday and this morning we still didn't find the solution till after FP4,” said Miller.
“In between FP4, while the Q1 was going one, we pulled the bike apart and changed a few other things.
“[We] really found a good setting for qualifying, the first tyre I really threw at it. I was only meant to do two laps in my run, but I made a small mistake coming out of Turn 6 and I decided to do one more.
“Immediately it was faster than all I had done previously this weekend with three laps on the tyres, and I felt good and once I had the banker in I put the new tyre in, and the first flying lap – which generally isn't the best one was my best one – because my next one I went through the first sector 0.19s under the lap before and got overly excited and braked to late for Turn 5 and went down.”
Speaking about his prospects for the race, Miller admits he was “surprised” with his pace in FP4 despite not feeling “comfy” on his GP17, and is “relaxed” ahead of Sunday's 24-lap contest.
“This is the third front row for us this year, and I think tomorrow's race, if FP4 is anything to go by, [Andrea] Dovizioso and Marc [Marquez] have really good pace.
“But I was surprised with our pace, I still wasn't very comfy with the bike. The change after FP4, I think we really improved it a lot.
“We had the soft on in FP4 and we were able to do 21 laps on the soft and stay in the 1:46s-middle, 1:46s-low.
“So I'm pretty relaxed about our pace, but it's just about surviving the first couple of laps, especially with the track being a little dirty and green in the first laps, as it was in Misano and it caught me out.
“So try not get overly excited tomorrow.”
