Two-day Le Mans test finished.
Only Nicky Hayden took part in the tests, while Max Biaggi had to sit out to recover from bruising.
Nicky Hayden was back on his RC211V, while his team-mate Max Biaggi could not take part in the tests due to the pain caused by the contusions from his crash during Sundays warm-up session. Hayden, keen to get back on the track after the disappointing result, covered 84 laps around the 4.18-km French circuit on Monday.
The 23-year-old rider worked hard on the track, for the fourth day in a row, simulating a race on intermediate Michelin tyres, with a satisfactory result. After the heavy crash on Sunday and the subsequent effort in the race, Biaggi could scarcely walk on Monday morning. Given his condition, it was decided that he should rest and the Italian rider set out yesterdays second test day as well, in order to guarantee his recovery. Nicky Hayden finished the second and last test day in Le Mans generally happy with the results, after setting the fastest time of the day, together with Sete Gibernau and Carlos Checa. With team-mate Max Biaggi in recovery, Hayden flew the Repsol Honda flag and worked hard with his team testing new suspension settings.
The North American was happy with the results of the two-day test prior to a short break before the season gets underway in early June with three Grand Prix in four weekends. Mugello, Italy on June 5, Catalunya, Spain on June 12 and Assen, Holland on June 25
Nicky Hayden.
Tuesday , best lap 133.7, 94 laps.
Monday, best lap 134.5, 84 laps.
We spent a useful day on the bike on Monday. It was wet in the morning but dried in the afternoon to make a pretty nice day. We had a good look at all the settings from the race and worked back from there. I think we found some useful stuff and we spent quite some time on some good Michelin intermediates that felt strong. We had also planned to work more on the chassis settings to see if we can get the bike to work better in the turns. We seem to have the speed down the straightaways but we’re losing time in the corners and at this level you have to be strong everywhere. Yesterday was a real positive day actually and a good way to head off on spring break. We checked a lot of things out with the suspension and my HRC guys tried a lot of stuff and I think we found some settings that worked. We refined things a lot and it was good to be able to get down into the 1m 33’s on race tyres and string a few laps together. We have a little less chatter from the bike which is positive. It’s been a pretty hard few days for the team and I want to thank my guys. We have a little time off now then we re-group at Mugello.
