Australian rider Dean Ferris did a great job at the Grand Prix of Portugal with a second place finish. The Monster Energy Yamaha rider claimed his second podium for 2013 and is now looking at being on the podium more often. Full of confidence and motivation Ferris will head to Brazil with the memory of his good speed last year, where he battled with the front runners in the muddy conditions.“It felt good to be back on the podium again, and it feels even better being on the podium in Portugal than it did in Qatar for the opening round. I mean I came back from injury, so that showed and I stayed busy on the mountain bike and keeping fit, and I didn’t lose any fitness while I was out injured. I felt really strong in both motos in Portugal and it showed that the hard work paid off.”
Ferris was quickly into a top three spot in both motos of the GP, which helped a lot as the circuit was difficult to make up lost ground. Despite a lot of pressure from fellow riders, and a mistake in the opening moto where he crashed, Ferris was still able to leave the Agueda circuit with a bunch of points and he has made good progress up the series points table.
“The first moto I messed up my start, but in the first two turns I was second and I broke away from third place, but then I slipped over and lost the front end and it took me a while to get going. After that I couldn’t go forward, I caught Ferrandis, but everyone else was too fast and I threw away a lot of points.”
“The second moto I was second behind Jeffrey and trying to push hard, but I made a mistake and then had a good battle with Tixier and it was close, but then I got away from Tixier and I was able to get second place. I didn’t know I was on the podium, so that was a nice surprise.”
“In the off season I knew I could be on the podium and I thought I would have more podiums now and I want to be a consistent podium guy. Of course my injury wrecked those plans, but I want to be on the podium in the future rounds for sure. I feel I have the speed and we are sorting a lot of things on the bike. We missed some testing due to my injury and in fact did a lot of testing in the races this weekend.”
Now with a race in Holland on Thursday and the trip to Brazil for the Grand Prix of Brazil the Australian has time to get his bike totally sorted and then enjoy the warmer weather of Brazil, of which he is obviously used to.
By Geoff Meyer