WorldSBK

Remy Gardner (GYTR GRT Yamaha WorldSBK Team) and Danilo Petrucci (Barni Spark Racing Team) were both penalised following their altercation in Free Practice 2 at the Cremona Circuit. With the MOTUL FIM Superbike World Championship visiting for the first time, both were hoping for a good result, but that was prevented for Race 1 as both were demoted from the grid for the Acerbis Italian Round.

Both Gardner and Petrucci were caught slow on the racing line by the FIM stewards during Friday's second free practice session and both received the same penalty: a three-place grid penalty for Race 1. This means Petrucci will start from sixth place instead of third, while Gardner will start from 19th place.^th instead of 16^th.

Following the conclusion of Friday's events, both the #87 and #9 spoke out about the incident and gave their version of events to summarise what happened. The incident occurred towards the end of FP2, with Petrucci's offence occurring on the approach to Turn 2 when Gardner had to swerve and ended up in the gravel. He kept his bike upright and rejoined the session.

Petrucci told his side of the story: “On the first lap I saw another rider stopping between the penultimate and the last corner, so I had to abort my first lap. I was two tenths faster. On the second lap I opened the throttle; I got closer again and was two tenths faster than my best lap. The blue flags were flying for me, but he decided to cross the track when I came. That really upset me. I don't know if I'll talk to him. I have no idea. He has his own idea. I saw him looking at me and I saw the blue flags, so I don't understand why he decided to cross the track. Let's focus on Saturday and the first of two days of racing.”

Giving his version of events, Gardner told a media scrum: “I got a penalty as well, which I don't agree with. I don't understand how I got the penalty. Three places. The team has appealed it and they're fully behind me. There's a video of me going off the left of the line in the final chicane and he gets through. I went off the line, out of the way. You can see me going out of the way because I was waiting for a breakaway. But they kept re-enforcing the three place penalty, which I said the team appealed. That was my out lap and I was just trying to get some free riding. I started my first lap on a new tyre and came into Turn 2 and Petrucci was just sitting up there on the line quite dangerously. And I had nowhere to go except to lift the bike up and go into the dirt. And I think I lost another extra flying lap as a result. And I got stuck in the dirt. I find it unbelievable that I get the same penalty when I actually come off the line and don't do what he did and he did something on purpose. It would be nice if my girlfriend paid me as much attention as Petrucci. I passed him in the steward's office but he didn't want to talk. Couldn't look at me. His head was down. I tried to look at him, talk to him, understand what the problem is. But sorry, I'm out there to do my own job, not to think about other drivers.”

On his rivalry with Petrucci and the incident at Most, where Petrucci, Bautista and Gardner were involved in a crash at Turn 1, the Australian said: “I can't even understand why Most is my fault at all. I can't even understand that he made those statements because he was behind me. What am I supposed to do when I'm in front? That's a driver thing. I try not to get involved in these stupid incidents. The only person I've knocked out so far is my teammate Domi. And we're best friends. I've known Danilo very well for 20 years. And I think we're two young guys. Maybe tonight I'll try to arrange something, talk to each other. I think I'm pretty mature in that regard. I'd like to talk to him to resolve that. I felt like he didn't want to talk to me in the steward's office, so I don't know. I have nothing against him. I treat all drivers the same. At the end of the day, they're all competitors. I ride fair and honest. I try not to knock anyone down because I know it's dangerous and injuries can happen. I think Danilo should have the same attitude.”

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