Initial conditions for Starobinsky inflation in general quadratic gravity

Abstract: We consider initial conditions leading to Starobinsky inflation in the general quadratic gravity, where the action of the theory contains one more curvature square invariant in addition to $R^2$. We have chosen corresponding coefficients in a way so that the inflationary solution keeps to be stable. Our numerical results show that despite the configuration of initial conditions in the $(H,R)$ plane, leading to Starobinsky inflation can change considerably from the $R^2$ theory, realization of inflation does not need a fine-tuning of the initial conditions.