MotoGP’s return to Europe began in promising fashion for the Fiat Yamaha Team and Valentino Rossi today, as the Italian finished the day second fastest with Yamaha riders filling the first three spots on the time sheets.
Rossi, who won this race for Yamaha in 2005 and 2007, got straight down to business this morning, working on a variety of improvements to bike and tyres following his tricky season-opening race in Qatar and finishing the first session third. It was immediately clear that things were improving for him and this afternoon he continued in the same vein, lapping consistently fast and finishing the day with a best time of 1’40.364. His team-mate Jorge Lorenzo finished the day just 0.043 seconds in front of him and third place was filled by Tech 3 rider Colin Edwards, with the Yamaha trio the only riders to dip under the existing lap rec ord pace.
Valentino Rossi
Position: 2nd
Time: 1'40.364
Laps: 44
“After Qatar, to be third this morning and second this afternoon on just the first day makes me quite happy! I feel comfortable on the bike and tyres, although we need to work a little bit harder to find the perfect race rhythm for Sunday. I had fun on the bike today and I am quite fast so I think we have a good base to build on. To have three Yamaha’s at the top again is great and once again shows how good our bike is. With the Bridgestones it feels quite good and I think we’re improving the package all the time but we can’t afford to stop working so tomorrow we will do the maximum once again. It’s great to be riding here in the sunshine and I think it’s going to be a great show this weekend for everyone!”
Davide Brivio - Team Manager “Today the team did a very good job. After the Qatar race our engineers have made a deep analysis of the issues we had there and they and have come here with some different ideas to try and they seem to be working well. It looks like we’ve found the right way to combine our bike and the tyres together and so we have a good base on which to build for the rest of the weekend. Now we have to concentrate on making the best tyre choice for the race, we already have a good pace but it’s going to be very competitive on Sunday so we need to be in the best possible shape!”
Ambient temperature: 21 degrees
Track temperature: 27 degrees
Humidity: 37%
Combined Free Practice Times: 1. Jorge Lorenzo (SPA) Fiat Yamaha Team 1'40.321
2. Valentino Rossi (ITA) Fiat Yamaha Team 1'40.364
3. Colin Edwards (USA) Tech 3 Yamaha 1'40.584
4. Nicky Hayden (USA) Repsol Honda 1'40.673
5. Dani Pedrosa (SPA) Repsol Honda 1'40.815
6. Casey Stoner (AUS) Ducati Marlboro 1'40.828
7. Andrea Dovizioso (ITA) JiR Team Scot MotoGP 1'40.909
8. James Toseland (GBR) Tech 3 Yamaha 1'41.028
9. Loris Capirossi (ITA) Rizla Suzuki MotoGP 1'41.157
10. Alex De Angelis (RSM) San Carlo Honda Gresini 1'41.189
11. Randy De Puniet (FRA) LCR Honda MotoGP 1'41.268
12. Chris Vermeulen (AUS) Rizla Suzuki 1'41.303
13. Shinya Nakano (JPN) San Carlo Honda Gresini 1'41.393
14. John Hopkins (USA) Kawasaki Racing 1'41.519
15. Marco Melandri (ITA) Ducati Marlboro 1'41.825
16. Sylvain Guintoli (FRA) Alice Team 1'42.115
17. Anthony West (AUS) Kawasaki Racing 1'42.181
18. Toni Elias (SPA) Alice Team 1'42.183
Jerez Lap Record: V. Rossi (Yamaha) 2005, 1'40.596
Jerez Best Lap: L. Capirossi (Ducati) 2006, 1'39.064
