Jake Dixon was frustrated to wind up sixth on the grid for the Moto2 Grand Prix of The Americas after admitting the GasGas Aspar team ‘lost our way’ in the run up to qualifying.

Returning to the scene of his maiden Moto2 podium in 2022, Dixon - who has now taken seven trips to the rostrum over the past 12 months - has been tipped to break his race win duck this weekend following a competitive start to the year.

However, having started the event well by topping P1 on Friday, evolving track conditions on Saturday - which started damp for P3 before a sharp rise in temperature for qualifying - left Dixon lacking in the fight for pole position.

Even so, he was able to salvage a spot on the second row, despite being forced into some quick avoiding action to jink away from Ai Ogura’s expiring Idemitsu Honda Kalex after it lost power directly in front of him in the final sector.

“I'm annoyed after the qualifying session, I was hoping for more,” he admitted. “We started the weekend very well, but we seem to have lost our way. We didn't have a good feeling with the bike and it was difficult to ride like that, but we will try to improve it with the team. 

“We have less time to work on the bike and the mixed conditions this morning didn't help, but I don't want to look for excuses. We gave everything we had and we'll see what happens tomorrow. “We know what we have to improve, but we have to be precise in what we do. Tomorrow we will try to give everything we have and we will see what happens.”