Smith: More data from Yamaha helped us in Malaysia

Bradley Smith has admitted that his complaints before Sepang about a lack of data-sharing from the factory Movistar Yamaha team to his Tech 3 team were in hindsight a good idea – and helped him towards taking one of his best results of the season in fourth.

 Complaining before the last race in Sepang that a change in direction from the factory team that wasn’t shared with them for the race had left him less competitive than he’d wished, Smith admitted that his comments had resulted in a rethink from the factory squad.

“It was good that some information trickled down to us at Malaysia. It helped us out, and was one of the main reasons for the good result on Sunday. We need that information, and the result clarified even more my point that my comments on the Thursday were legitimate.

“I got a bit of a telling off for saying what I did, but I proved my point with Sunday’s result. Being too honest, but stating facts – and it worked; it nearly got me a podium!”

And despite finishing the day at Valencia back in fifteenth today, the 24-year-old says that he’s relaxed about going forwards into qualifying tomorrow.

“I tired to play a bit of a smart day today, work on problems, use both bikes in the sessions, play with a few ideas, and make sure we’re not trying to chase our backsides too much tomorrow. That should leave us in a more secure area for Sunday too.

“Speed in the last sector was the main thing we were lacking. Edge grip around long corners as well – around eight, nine and thirteen seemed to be losing us a lot of time. They’re both quite similar, I believe they’re going to be easy to fix, and I think we’ll be OK tomorrow.”