Casey Stoner - Photo Credit: Repsol Honda
Repsol Honda riders Casey Stoner and Dani Pedrosa had contrasting feelings at the end of day one at Jerez, host of the final pre-season MotoGP test. Stoner was the fastest man after a late run on soft tyres and felt happier with the RC213V as the day progressed.
“Today has been quite good, we did race distance with a soft set tyres this morning and we were getting quicker and quicker as we progressed but I think also the circuit was getting better. Then we put the hard tyre on and did a tyre comparison and we had very similar feelings to what we had in Sepang. We tried a few things with the chassis as the bike was proving slow to turn in the corner but in general it is working well especially at the end of the tyre life. On the last exit we did our fastest lap on a new soft rear tyre. It’s been a good first day”.
Teammate Pedrosa had a frustrating day with regular changes to the bike restricting his time on track. Despite that, the Spaniard finished third overall and will look to build on the good work tomorrow.
“It’s been a pretty tough day, the mechanics had a lot of work to do in the garage and I’ve been stationary a long time, so it was not easy to get into the rhythm quickly. But I’m happy because we have a clear idea about the changes we need to do on the bike to improve tomorrow, especially on braking and the exits of the corners. We also tested the new front Bridgestone tyre, but just for a few laps, so I will keep testing it tomorrow to know if it’s better. Unfortunately, in the afternoon I had a problem on one bike and I couldn’t use it anymore, so I spent quite a long time in the box between runs and thinking about the changes we want to do. We didn’t have too much chattering today, but I think it’s because of the circuit characteristics”.
