The team has left behind the unfortunate accident on the second curve that ended the hopes of the two Repsol Honda Team riders at Misano and got down to work on an in-depth Michelín tyre testing program.The setup was also modified in preparation for the forthcoming race in the World Championship, to be held in two weeks in Portugal, starting on 16th September.
Nicky Hayden was a hard task-master on himself, demonstrating once again that the reigning World Champion has not lost his enthusiasm for work nor his motivation. The American did 134 laps of the 4.180km Circuit of Misano, almost equivalent to the distance of five races, and was an incredible three hours and a half riding out on the track at a fast pace. It was time well-invested since Hayden set a best lap time of 1’34.26 with race tyres.
Dani Pedrosa also put in hard day`s work, he did 95 laps on his RC212V. The Spaniard spent valuable time working on his chassis setup using the data obtained over the weekend. Michelin provided a wide range of tyre options for testing, and with one of these Pedrosa set a best lap time of 1’34.36. He is third in the overall standings for the season so far and the young Repsol rider will be after a good result in Portugal in 15 days time so that he can cut the 18 points that separate him from Valentino Rossi, in second place.
Nicky Hayden,
1m 34.26s – 134 laps
“I am quite pleased with these tests. I did a lap of 1’34.26 with race tyres, which is quite a decent time and really makes yesterday`s accident even more frustrating. We were probably close to the pace yesterday, but I thought that today, without making any changes, we could be capable of going even faster. Moreover, when I went off the track yesterday I damaged the tyre, so we were not able to learn anything from the race. I am not going to deceive anybody and say that we can get to the same level as Stoner, but today I was able to do good lap times comfortably. The track conditions were a lot better and that helped a lot. We did some important work with Michelín and they are making a real big effort, although I cannot say that they have been able to calculate much, because towards the end I put the reference tyre back on and did my fastest lap of the weekend. The team has done an excellent job, and so I give them my thanks. We will go to Portugal and try to use this information”
Dani Pedrosa,
1m 34.36s – 95 laps
“These were some very useful tests and we got some information about the bike and the tyres on this circuit, information that we could not collect in yesterday`s race. It may seem quite difficult to get back to testing after such a disappointing result – I only did about two hundred metres before I was knocked off – but once we got out on the track the conditions were quite good and we were able to spend some time testing tyres and some parts of the setup. I am dying for the next race; I want to do a good job there and get the sort of results that the team deserves.”
