Casey Stoner - Photo Credit: Repsol Honda Team
Casey Stoner says the Repsol Honda team still have plenty to work on despite setting the pace on day two of the Official MotoGP test in Malaysia. The World Champion could only manage four laps due to a strained muscle in his back yesterday but was back to full fitness today, completing 29 laps aboard the RC213V.
Stoner admitted he would like to have completed more mileage but feels there is plenty to look forward to, and to work on, with the new Honda.
“It was great to be able to ride today and everything went pretty well, although I would have liked to have done a few more laps. We spent most of the day on the new chassis comparing it back to back with the one we had in Valencia and we found a good direction and where we want to go. As usual it would be great to take some elements from one chassis and some from the other, but at least we found the direction we are happy to follow. We used the hard front tyre this afternoon but found we had more chattering with it so we have to work on this, there is still room for improvement. We didn’t get a chance to use the new spec tyres that Bridgestone have brought here, we’ll try them out tomorrow and go from there”.
Teammate Dani Pedrosa was fourth fastest, six tenths down on Stoner and was also cautiously optimistic with one day of the test remaining.
“Today we started to work well from the beginning; the track conditions were better than yesterday and it was hotter out there. We’ve been working on the setting of the bike, focusing mainly on the braking and reducing chatter, to improve the stability on the entry of the corners, that’s our main target right now. We made some comparisons between the two chassis’ and we will keep working with the bike and see what can we do before choosing. We have one more day, so we’ll try some other things with the shocks, this could help, and also different tyre pressures, we will see. I didn’t do many laps during the day, but now it’s time to test as much as possible and sometimes you have to spend more time in the garage, it’s normal. The new Bridgestone tyres are working ok, I just tried one hard on the rear but I didn’t have much grip and the soft ones are working better, even for the endurance they don’t look so bad”.
