Estoril MotoGP: Casey Stoner trying to remain calm

Reigning world champion Casey Stoner says he won’t let his frustrations boil over after his Estoril nightmare continued in qualifying this afternoon.

The Aussie will start tomorrow’s 28-lap race from ninth on the grid as he continued his shock struggle to set up Ducati’s factory GP8 machine.

Stoner though said he would focus on remaining calm despite his third row start, which comes hot on the heels of his worst result for Ducati when he was only 11th in Jerez last month.

“We were struggling a little bit for confidence coming here after the problems we had at Jerez and even though I was expecting a better performance at this track we’ve found similar difficulties, “said Stoner. 

“We’re really struggling for a set-up and I don’t think there’s much more we can get out of the bike here. Even so, we need to look ahead to the warm-up tomorrow to try and find a better solution in a way that will let me fight in the race.

“Things went so smoothly for us last year that it would be easy to get frustrated with our current situation but they way out of it is to stay calm and have belief in each other.

“I know I’ve got a great team and a great factory behind me, so we’ll keep working together until we turn things around. Basically we need to sleep on what’s happened over the last two days and head into tomorrow’s warm-up in a positive and productive manner.”