Nicky Hayden stayed at the circuit of the Twin Ring at Motegi to train after yesterday`s Japanese GP. The 2006 World Champion took advantage of this extra chance to work to test and analyse some modifications on the suspension, and some new high-performance tyres provided by Michelin.
Hayden did 86 laps of the circuit in Japan and set the third best time, 1 minute 48.065 seconds. The weather was quite a bit cooler than than the 30º experienced on the Friday and Saturday, which meant that the American was not able to equal his fastest lap with last weekend`s race tyres, he did several laps at 1’47.597 on the Saturday morning. In spite of the cloud cover during the whole day, it did not rain like yesterday, only a few drops falling.
After being thrown off his bike during yesterday`s race, Hayden`s teammate, Dani Pedrosa did not stay to train. The Repsol rider, third in the World MotoGP Championship, caught a plane to Barcelona this morning where his left foot will be X-rayed and the extent of the injury diagnosed.The Repsol Honda Team returns to work tomorrow and will carry on training at Motegi before taking a two week break until the Australian GP which takes place on 14th October.
Nicky Hayden,
1’48.065 secs. 86 laps 413km.
Compared to yesterday I think that if things had happened differently we could have got a much better result, so the only thing left to do was to get back down to work. This morning we made some changes and tested some modifications on the HRC. We also tested some Michelin tyres, seeking to improve the grip and the performance on the first few laps so that they can be faster. That occupied most of the day since at this moment in time tyres play a very important role. We were lucky concerning the weather since it looked like it was going to rain but today was not a day to go to the beach. At times my visor got steamed up but we managed to do quite a lot.
Non official lap times Rider team Time Laps
- Chris Vermeulen Rizla Suzuki MotoGP 1m 47.894s
- Colin Edwards Fiat Yamaha Team 1m 47.947s
- Nicky Hayden Repsol Honda Team 1m 48.065s 86
- Valentino Rossi Fiat Yamaha Team 1m 48.213s
- Kousuke Akiyoshi Rizla Suzuki Team 1m 49.090s
- Akira Yanagawa Kawasaki Racing Team 1m 50.229s
- Tadayuki Okada HRC Test Rider 1m 50.641s
- Nobuatsu Aoki Suzuki Test Rider 1m 50.675s
