The spectacular circuit of Laguna Seca is the possibly the only one in the world with a corner like the impressive and frightening Corkscrew chicane – a double left-right hander going steeply downhill. And this venue typically sees, because of its peculiar characteristics, intense duels such as the one between Valentino Rossi and Casey Stoner last year.
This year the two Repsol Honda Team riders, Andrea Dovizioso and Dani Pedrosa, are facing the 8th GP of the season with the objective of fighting to be up with the leaders. For the time being the start to the weekend has been encouraging and the Repsol Honda Team riders finished up with the fastest riders in the first free practice at Laguna Seca.
With a warm temperature – air 24º C and track 48º C – and a light breeze the first session passed without any special incidents, something that allowed Dani Pedrosa and Andrea Dovizioso to start work setting up their bikes for Sunday. Tyre selection, the suspension and the other adjustments occupied their time in the first session of the weekend.
Dani Pedrosa, 4th best time and on his last lap – six tenths behind Rossi, 1st – did a total of 31 laps. Andrea Dovizioso also did 31 laps and like his teammate set the best time on his last lap, finishing 6th at the end of the session, 8 tenths behind his compatriot Rossi.
Dani Pedrosa, 1’22.637 secs, 31 laps, 112 km >> Audio
“I’m quite happy with how this session went on my return to Laguna Seca after missing most of last year’s race meeting. I took my time this afternoon, getting familiar with the layout again before working up to full pace later in the session. We did a lot of laps and at the end of the session my hip was a little bit painful, but it wasn’t too bad and I was able to ride the bike as normal. That’s important here because this is a circuit where the machine wheelies and shakes quite a lot so you need to be able to control it. We have to work a little more to get the correct gearing and to improve the set-up so I think tomorrow morning’s session will be very important to prepare for qualifying. I’m feeling confident for tomorrow”.
Andrea Dovizioso, 1’22.880 secs, 31 laps, 112 km >> Audio
“The lap times came easily today and I’m quite happy with the pace we were able to achieve. We did three runs with the soft Bridgestone tyres and then the last run with the hard tyre option and the results were promising. It took a while for the hard tyres to warm up though, so in the end I couldn’t push as hard as I wanted to improve my lap time. Because of that I’m confident we have room to go quicker tomorrow. Despite the fact that it was quite easy to get the rhythm, I’m not totally happy with my feeling from the front of the bike in the middle of the turn so we will need to work on that and try a few options tomorrow. I like the challenge of this track and the atmosphere here, so I’m looking forward to getting back out there in the morning”.
