PETRONAS Sprinta Racing’s Darryn Binder ended Qualifying for the Algarve GP in seventh, giving him a spot on the third row tomorrow.

Darryn was one of the first riders to go quicker than yesterday in FP3 and momentarily held the top spot on the timing screens. He booked his place in Q2 with a 1min 48.228secs lap, putting him ninth in FP3 and tenth overall.

After setting a good banker lap on his first run of Q2, the South African looked set to be on a blisteringly quick lap, but found himself held up in a group. He managed to squeeze in one last lap – 1min 47.712secs – to end the session seventh, securing a place on the third row of the grid.

Darryn Binder
7th (1’47.712)

I’m quite happy as today has been a good day for me and I’ve felt good on the bike. Plus we’ve been improving step-by-step. I was quite happy with the lap time in Qualifying and I thought it would have given me a better spot on the grid, but I’m in seventh. That’s good enough, even though we always aim for the front two rows. If I’d had a bit more luck then maybe I could have strung a better lap together. It’s so good to see John on the front row though and he’s having a strong weekend so far. It’s always good for the team for both riders to be up the front and I always enjoy racing against John. I think we’ve definitely got a chance for a good result tomorrow, so hopefully we can get to the front and work together to keep things under control, to finish as high as we can.