MotoGP™ rookie Marc Márquez leaves Circuit of the Americas with confidence, having topped all three days of this week’s private test. Just four riders took to the track on Thursday, with Dani Pedrosa and Stefan Bradl completing the top three.
The third and final day of on-track action was the calmest of the week, not least as both Yamaha Factory Racing and GPTech’s Michael Barnes had elected to end their programmes on Wednesday. There were no significant changes weather-wise, with a blue sky and light breeze accompanying ambient temperatures ranging from the mid to high 20s.
Staying on-track right until the end of the day and then requesting more time, Márquez racked up a mammoth 60 laps – just three off the equivalent of three full race distances – and reduced his best effort from 24 hours earlier by over half a second, to 2:03.281. Electing not to complete a race simulation, the 20-year-old focused solely on bike setup and was pleased with his overall progress before personally thanking his team.
Some six tenths slower than his teammate, Pedrosa spent much of the test fine-tuning gearbox settings. The elder of the two Spaniards was forced to end his running early due to a sore neck; the specific cause of the pain is yet to be identified.
Bradl’s LCR Honda MotoGP machine was a further three and a half tenths in arrears, with the German admitting to motogp.com that improvements are needed under braking – an area the 2011 Moto2™ title winner described as a usual personal strong point. For this reason, he struggled to achieve consistent sector times and will be looking to improve on this in April.
Blake Young was the sole remaining CRT runner, managing 42 tours on his Attack Performance, in-house-constructed APR-Kawasaki. For the record, his personal best run of 2:12.186 was just under nine seconds off Márquez’s leading effort.
The Yamaha Factory Racing duo of Jorge Lorenzo and Valentino Rossi ended their programme after two of the three days of this week’s private test.
“The test here was organized by Honda to cover three days, but we knew from the beginning that two days would be enough for us,” explained Yamaha Team Director Massimo Meregalli. “The target was to allow the riders to get used to the circuit and get as much data as possible for our Japanese engineers.”
Both Lorenzo and Rossi improved over the course of the second day, cutting back their personal best lap times while continuing to search for more grip.
“I feel better today,” the Spaniard began. “In the last run before the lunch break, we changed the setup of the bike and improved by some tenths, so we are closer to the fastest riders, but not as much as we would like. We were too soft on the suspension to start with, but we made it harder and at this track that works…we have been trying different setups – no new parts, just playing with the setup and changing the suspension and forks – and on the last run I improved by half a second (just) with setup changes.”
Italy’s Rossi echoed the sentiments of his teammate, with whom he reunites in 2013 after a two-year spell with Ducati Team yielded no race victories for the nine-time title winner.
“Step-by-step we improved a lot from yesterday but have some disadvantages compared to the other guys, so we need to put all the sections together,” he admitted. “The target was to come here and try to understand the track and try to be ready for the race.
“Our competitors are able to accelerate faster than us from the hairpin and they have a bit more grip on the edge compared to us, so these are the areas where we have to work.”
–From motogp.com
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