Casey Stoner declared himself happy with his first day back with Ducati as their private test got underway at Sepang on Saturday. The Australian has returned to the team he won his first MotoGP world championship with in 2007 and, together with Michele Pirro, is assisting the Bologna squad with their 2016 preparations.
Although he admitted to struggling early in the day, Stoner eventually racked up 54 laps and was impressed with the GP15 machine.
“It’s been a really good experience today with the Ducati Team. I wasn’t too sure what to expect but everybody has been fantastic, welcoming me and working with me to try and get the best out of myself and this bike. I need some time to get back to speed and get the feeling back, because I haven’t ridden a MotoGP bike for one year and any bike at all for six months. It was a very productive first day, we got comfortable with the bike and the tyres a lot more quickly than I thought I would. We’ve got a lot of things to test and get myself a little bit more acquainted with the bike but generally I’m very happy. The Desmosedici GP has a lot of potential, hopefully we can give the right input and help the two Andreas to try and achieve something great this year. I’m pretty happy and surprised with my lap time to be honest, hopefully the next day we can be a bit more comfortable after sleeping on it. It’s been fantastic working with Gabriele (Conti) again and with Marco (Palmerini) and Gigi (Dall’Igna): everyone has been really professional. So far, so good!”
Pirro’s involvement was much more limited, only completing a handful of laps on a 2016-spec machine, and expects a much busier schedule later in the week.
“Today I only did a few laps because the schedule only included a test of electronic components followed by one for fuel economy, so once I had finished my work, the team concentrated on Casey’s debut. Tomorrow we’ll do a few more things before the first of the three days of official tests that get underway on Monday. The feeling is good and even on Wednesday we managed to do a good job. I am sure that we can get some good results, and having tested both Iannone’s and Dovizioso’s bikes I feel confident, despite the fact that the track conditions here are not very good.”
