Repsol Honda Team complete successful test at The Circuit of The Americas

The private MotoGP test held in Austin has come to a conclusion for Repsol Honda’s Marc Marquez and Dani Pedrosa.

It has been a valuable test for the two Spanish riders who shaved over eight seconds off their times from the first outing here on Tuesday. Rookie Marc Marquez finished on top with a fastest time of 2’03.281 recorded today on lap 38 of 57. Marc has used this test to further familiarise himself with the MotoGP machine and has spent time working with the electronics and gearing on his Honda RC213V.

His teammate Dani Pedrosa finished 2nd fastest with today’s time of 2’03.898 taken on lap 4 of 25. After testing some settings in the morning, Dani decided not to do so many laps in the afternoon due to a slight neck strain from the morning. He will now rest ahead of next week’s final pre-season test in Jerez on the 23rd, 24th and 25th of March, where he will look to confirm the setup changes and new rear shock that he tested in Austin.

The first race of 2013 is now less than a month away with the Grand Prix of Qatar taking place on 7th April.

Dani Pedrosa >> Audio (english)

2:03.898, 24 laps, 132 km.
“After the first exit this morning I had a pain in my neck, I’m not sure what caused it but it affected my riding so I decided not to do so many laps today. Everything has gone well though in general, we had three positive days and I’m happy we came here, because we were able to put in many laps of this circuit which is very tricky and difficult. There are some heavy braking points and some blind corners, so it was important to test here to find the references. We weren’t able to try much in terms of settings, because we didn’t know the track and the surface wasn’t 100% with so few riders here, but we’ve been improving. We only tried the soft compound tyre, but in general the feeling is positive. I’d like to thank Honda for making the effort to come here, it has been valuable and I am very grateful!”

Marc Marquez >> Audio (english)

2:03.281, 60 laps, 331 km.
“This final day has been good for me. From the beginning I had the same feeling as yesterday and especially this morning we started to try some technical settings for the first time and we found some big improvements. After lunch we were considering a race simulation but in the end we spent the time working with the electronics. It’s been important to come and test here as we will be here for the second race. It’s quite a physical track –especially the first sector– but in the end, we now know the track a little and we have a good base for when we come here for the GP.”