The MotoGP riders have done their first night of practice under the floodlights in preparation for the Qatar Grand Prix. Yesterday`s strong sandstorm left the track very dirty and after the rain last night the situation did not improve. The dirty track surface and the lack of adherence did not let the riders set fast times and today`s best lap, set by the Australian Stoner, was almost two seconds off the record for the circuit.
For the Repsol Honda Team, it was a day to get some contact with the track in Qatar. Andrea Dovizioso had a good first ever free practice session defending the Repsol Honda Team colours. Although the Italian finished eighth he was among the fastest five riders throughout the session, and just a couple of minutes before the end overtook some of his rivals. Dovizioso did 16 laps, and set a best time of 1 minute 58,506 seconds.
Dani Pedrosa has finally put his riding-suit back on after a five week break without a glimpse of his Honda RC212V. Today the Repsol Honda Team rider just concentrated on getting back his sensations on a bike of this type, taking into account his physical condition and lack of rhythm after more than a month in dry dock. To get back into the swing Pedrosa first did a set of ten laps, and a second of seven, and improved his times a little until he set a 2’01.435. Aware of his physical limitations and lack of practice got faster but without pushing himself too much so that afterwards he could assess how his return to competition riding had been. He was eighteenth in the first free practice session but the young Repsol rider is confídent that he will gradually improve so that he can achieve his objective which is to win as many points as possible next Sunday.
Dani Pedrosa 18th, 2’01.435 sec, 17 laps, 91 km. >> Audio
“Well, I was able to ride for the whole session tonight and that was the first target for Qatar. I didn’t feel so great on the bike to be honest, but I expected this after such a long time without riding. I have to readapt to the speed, the braking points, the demands of riding a MotoGP machine again and this will take some time. My knee of course did not feel one hundred per cent and we will have to see how it improves over the course of the next practice sessions. Because I can’t bend the knee as far as I’d like, my riding position is not normal and this means I feel quite awkward on the bike at the moment. It’s too early for me to really make a judgment on the level of the bike because my pace was not fast enough today to really work on machine set-up. We knew this was going to be a challenging session and we were prepared for this, so we’ll come back tomorrow and aim to take some more steps forward.”
Andrea Dovizioso 8th, 1’58.506 sec, 16 laps, 86 km. >> Audio
“I was very excited this evening, it was my first official practice riding for HRC on the RC212V factory bike, so I was even more excited than last year when I made my debut in MotoGP. It’s a great feeling. Racing at night is fascinating and I enjoy starting the season here in Qatar. I’m actually feeling pretty confident. We have improved things compared to the last test in Jerez and today was all about preparation for the race. With only 45-minute practice sessions there’s less time to work on the bike and we’ve had to change our method of working to make best use of the session. We still have some issues with the machine to sort out, but I’m confident. Today we had a positive session and my team will look at making further adjustments to the settings tomorrow.”
