Repsol Honda riders Nicky Hayden and Dani Pedrosa completed a vital two-day test session at Jerez today, putting both men in positive mood for upcoming races.
Although the sun shone once again, conditions weren’t ideal with strong winds blowing dust and debris onto the circuit. For this reason Pedrosa stopped earlier than usual, at around 3.30pm. Hayden kept going till the end of the day, using qualifying tyres for his final, fastest lap.
Both riders focused on tyre testing with Mi chelin, trying different 16.5-inch rear tyres. World Championship leader Pedrosa also tried wider profile Michelin fronts, which he had been unable to evaluate before due to his preseason testing injury.
Pedrosa and Hayden will be back on their Repsol Honda RC212Vs on Friday April 11 when practice begins for the Portuguese Grand Prix, round three of the 2008 MotoGP World Championship.
Nicky Hayden, fastest lap: 1m 38.940s (lap 86 of 86)“Everything went real smooth. We did a lot a work with Michelin, tried to check a few tyres’ durability, and I was able to string together a few high 39s on race tyres, which we were pretty happy with. We also tuned the bike a little bit, tuned the rider too, worked on a few things, and overall it’s been a real positive day. We’ve got the chassis working good, now we need to work on the engine because we’re coming up to some tracks with big long straightaways.”
Dani Pedrosa, fastest lap: 1m 40.099s (lap 16 of 41)
“Today we worked on tyres with our Michelin technicians and it was a very useful day. We focused mainly on the front tyre, testing different fronts because so far I’ve only used Michelin’s standard profile . We found some interesting solutions. We also tested some rears that Michelin brought here for testing. I didn't use qualifying tyres. These two days have been very important in getting us more familiar with the bike and helping us work some more on setup. I stopped early this afternoon because track conditions weren’t so good, the wind was blowing a lot of dust and dirt onto the track.”
Lap Times:1. Nicky HAYDEN - Repsol Honda Team HONDA 1.38.940 - 86 laps
2. Dani PEDROSA - Repsol Honda Team HONDA 1.40.099 - 41 laps
3 Chris VERMEULEN - Rizla Suzuki MotoGP SUZUKI 1.40.184 – 44 laps
4. Loris CAPIROSSI - Rizla Suzuki MotoGP SUZUKI 1.40.776 – 24 laps
5. Olivier Jacques - Kawasaki racing 1.41.852 – 47 laps
6. William Costes -Yamaha 1.42.581 – 72 laps
