'It's All About How You Choose to Respond'
Cormac Buchanan's Catalunya weekend has been brutal. Sunday is the chance to put that right.
Nothing to lose. Heaps to learn.
That’s where Cormac Buchanan finds himself heading into Sunday’s Moto3 Grand Prix at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya — last on the grid, 25 riders stretching out ahead of him. Targets on their backs for the Kiwi down on his luck but never without fight.
Barcelona has been a circuit the Southland teen has openly struggled to adapt to all weekend. Q1 exacerbated the storyline thus far — Buchanan clocked 1:48.703 but finished 12th and last, 1.418 seconds behind Italian Guido Pini’s session-topping time.
Only the top four advance to Q2, and that margin was never in reach.
Later in Q2, Argentina’s Valentin Perrone claimed pole with a 1:46.679, edging Spaniards David Muñoz (+0.005) and Brian Uriarte (+0.019) — all three on KTMs. Championship leader Maximo Quiles slotted 7th. Just 0.744 seconds covered the entire top 16.
But here’s what the raw numbers don’t show.
Buchanan improved every single session across the weekend — 1:50.365 in a crash disrupted FP1, 1:49.186 in timed practice, 1:48.794 in FP2, 1:48.703 in Q1.
More than one and a half seconds found across four sessions despite everything working against him. Something to grasp onto heading into Sunday’s grand prix.
“A really difficult weekend so far, and I’ve been struggling a lot to adapt to this circuit,” the 19-year-old said.
“In qualifying I couldn’t get a clean lap together, which compromised our Q1. But on used tyres I felt solid and was able to show some good late-race simulation pace in FP2, which gives us something positive heading into tomorrow.
“Tomorrow the goal is to give my maximum from start to finish, use the race to learn and understand what’s been missing this weekend, and try to move as far forward as possible.
“Big thanks to the team for continuing to believe in me. Weekends like these can happen, it’s all about how you choose to respond to them.”
Friday - “One of Those Days…”
Friday at Barcelona-Catalunya didn’t go to plan, leaving Buchanan “playing a bit of catch up” heading into Saturday qualifying at round 6 of the FIM Moto3 World Championship.
A crash with nearly 5 mins of FP1 still to run cost the Southland teen laps he couldn’t afford to lose, and the knock-on effect showed in timed practice — 25th of 26, 2.150 seconds behind Honda Aussie Jack Kelso in 14th and a direct Q2 berth.
Malaysian Hakim Danish set the Friday benchmark at 1:46.943 in cool conditions. Buchanan, also on a KTM like Danish, clocked 1:49.186.
The gap is real. So is the Kiwi’s determination for Saturday’s Q1 where Buchanan (CODE Motorsports) will fight for one of the two spots into Q2.
“This morning we had some issues which made us miss a lot of laps in FP1, this made things difficult to get up to speed fast and we carried that into the afternoon,” Buchanan said.
“Still, we keep learning and working, I’m confident that tomorrow we can make the necessary improvements in order to get us back in the game this weekend. We keep pushing and ready to take another step forward with my team tomorrow.”
The six-time NZSBK title winner has been here before. He’ll come out swinging. - Kent Gray