Andrea Dovizioso recorded the third fastest time on Thursday on the first day of the second official MotoGP test of the year in Sepang, Malaysia.
The Repsol Honda rider shaved well in excess of half a second off the time from his previous test outing in posting a lap time of 2m 01.631s in his 52 completed laps of the Sapang International Circuit.
Dovizioso's result will be pleasing for the Repsol Honda team, as it is a significant improvement from his first official test three weeks ago at the same venue, where the Italian’s time was sixth best and the rider is hopeful that further progress can be made in tomorrow's second test day.
“I’m very happy about this first day of testing," Dovizioso said. "We have the third fastest time but the most important thing is that we were able to consistently improve our pace. On every session out of the pits we were able to go quickly and this is encouraging."
"Of course there is still a lot of work to do as we have to reduce the gap from the first riders but I’m confident, and I’m very happy of the development work done by Honda. Tomorrow we want to do more laps to confirm our race pace.”
Team-mate Dani Pedrosa didn’t enjoy the day quite as much as Dovizioso, as he suffered a fall at turn nine after completing 26 laps, but he returned to the circuit unharmed to complete 47 laps in the day on his factory RC212V with a best time of 2m 02.036s.
The Spaniard explained exactly what happened at turn nine: "I had a slow-speed crash in the hairpin because basically I braked too late but didn’t want to run off the track - and the front folded," he said.
Despite that minor setback, Pedrosa remains upbeat ahead of tomorrow's second day.
"Testing is important for us because there’s not too much time left before the season starts," he said. "So we’ll be looking for a productive day tomorrow.”
Pedrosa’s time was seventh best, which was one place ahead of Mika Kallio on board the Pramac Racing Ducati Desmosedici GP10.
The Finn certainly put the work in, riding the highest number of laps of the day – 76 in total – and whilst trying out different front forks, still managed to post an encouraging lap time that was just 0.002s slower than that of Pedrosa.
Interwetten Honda rookie, Hiroshi Aoyama, recorded the 12th fastest lap time of the day on the privateer RC212V and the Japanese rider will be boosted by his time of 2m 02.149s from his 57 laps, which was an improvement on his previous test time.
As was the case at the first Sepang test three weeks ago, Valentino Rossi topped the timesheet on his factory YZR-M1, as he set a best lap time of 2m 01.068s.
The riders are scheduled to return to the circuit for the second and final day of testing on Friday morning at 10am Malaysian time.
MotoGP Sepang test day one times
1) Valentino Rossi (Yamaha) 2m01.068s from 47 laps
2) Casey Stoner (Ducati) 2m01.219s + 0.151s from 33
3) Andrea Dovizioso (Honda) 2m01.631s + 0.563s from 52
4. Loris Capirossi (Suzuki) 2m01.687s + 0.619s from 52
5. Ben Spies (Tech 3 Yamaha) 2m01.843s + 0.775s from 42
6. Colin Edwards (Tech 3 Yamaha) 2m01.897s + 0.829s from 35
7. Dani Pedrosa (Honda) 2m02.036s + 0.968s from 47
8. Mika Kallio (Pramac Ducati) 2m02.038s + 0.970s from 76
9. Alvaro Bautista (Suzuki) 2m02.078s + 1.010s from 34
10. Marco Melandri (Gresini Honda) 2m02.086s + 1.018s from 52
12. Hiroshi Aoyama (Interwetten Honda) 2m02.419s + 1.351s from 57
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