Hayden and Pedrosa almost on the front row in Jerez.
Fourth and fifth place for the North American and the Spaniard in the MotoGP qualifying session. Aoyama, fourth in the 250cc does get a place on the front row.
The first race of the 2006 season has already starting grids after today’s qualifying practices, which started rather troubled in the MotoGP class. The engine of Alex Hoffman’s bike broke down after the first few laps leaving a big trail of oil on the track which only a few seconds later made Valentino Rossi, Toni Elías, Kenny Roberts, Shinya Nakano and Randy de Puniet crash. The incident didn’t cause any personal injury but a twenty-minute stop of the session until the circuit services managed to leave the track in adequate conditions. After the session was restarted, the Ducati machines played the leading role taking the first and second places of the time sheets. Both Repsol Honda Team riders confirmed the good feelings of the previous days with a prudent performance, looking to clock the fastest times towards the end of the practice, which was held under a slightly covered sky but under perfect conditions.
Hayden was very satisfied with the performance of his qualifying tyres, which allowed him to be fast in the right moment. The bike hasn’t the perfect set-up yet but Nicky expects to improve its behaviour with some changes they are going to test during the warm-up session tomorrow morning. Pedrosa declares to have made some mistakes during the planning of the practice and is satisfied both with the position and with the set-up of the motorbike, which should allow him to go for a place among the top. Dani’s aim in this session, which was dominated by Capirossi and Gibernau, was to quickly adapt to riding on qualifying tyres.
Shuhei Aoyama did get a place on the front row after a session in which Jorge Lorenzo set the fastest times. The Japanese rider confirmed the excellent expectations created yesterday but is not happy with the set-up of his bike. Porto, further in the back, was the negative side of the session and in the 250cc class only Aoyama seems to be able to fight for the podium in Jerez. Young British rider Bradley Smith, in his logical adaptation process in the 125cc class of the Motorcycling World Championship, also finished in the lower part of the time sheets.
Statements
MotoGP. Nicky Hayden:
‘It would have been nice to be on the front row – I mean Capirossi put down a smoking lap. The Michelin qualifying tyres worked pretty good today – it’s been a while since I rode on real qualifying tyres and they’re fun. Some of our problems were cured with qualifiers so I’m not thrilled with fourth but it’s respectable and it gives us a chance. The session was strange with the stop for oil at the start. We tried some stuff early in the session but I didn’t have as good a feeling as we did in the morning so we went back little-by-little to what we had. Tomorrow’s race day and we’ve got our horse and we’re going to show up and ride it as hard as we can. In the morning warm-up we’re going to try some things to get the bike turning a little bit better and to get the tyres to last a bit longer, and to see if I can make some progress at my end. I’ll need a good start. This Jerez crowd is unbelievable – tomorrow’s going to be fun and I’m ready’.
MotoGP. Dani Pedrosa:
‘This session was difficult because riding on qualifying tyres is not so easy and you have to plan very well in terms of riding the lap and with the set up of the machine. We made some mistakes with the planning, and yet I think my position is good. I’m not yet at 100 per cent – I’m still very inexperienced and still have to learn step-by-step but for the first qualifying session I think the position is very good and I’m happy with it. My feeling for the race set-up is quite good because we tested here two weeks ago and this gave us a good basic set-up. I’m looking forward to finally going racing because that is when we will see the real level. I will hope the Spanish fans enjoy the race!’
250. Shuhei Aoyama:
‘I’m on the front row but I’m not too happy because neither the rider nor the bike are at the highest level. We still have to improve the set-up of the bike and the rider has to push harder to be faster. We have evidently improved compared to yesterday but it’s not enough. We know which tyres we are going to use for the race. A good result for tomorrow would be the victory or a place on the podium.’
250. Sebastián Porto:
‘All I can say is that my team and I are working hard to try to solve this situation. We just don’t manage to make the bike work the way I want it to. I’ve tried to adapt to it but I haven’t managed yet. I tried to change my racing lines, enter and exit corners in a different way, change my riding style&but we just don’t move forward. In moments like this is when I wish to thank my team more than ever for the effort they are making to try to find a solution.’
125. Bradley Smith:
‘It’s been better than yesterday, but it hasn’t been perfect. I wasn’t really focussed this morning during the first session. It was a bit better during the second, although I didn’t make many laps either. I think that I could have clocked a better time, but I made a mistake. The last laps were very slow because I didn’t have enough grip. I was very fast in my last lap on the first two sections, but then, I think it was in corner nine, the rear end of the bike skidded and I almost crashed. The last race I did here last year consisted of sixteen laps, so tomorrow I’ll make seven more. We’ve tested the race tyres and I’ve seen that we can set good times despite the progressive wear, so that doesn’t bother me. Scoring points here would be incredible, but being realistic I think that it would be good to finish among the top twenty.’
