Dani Pedrosa remained on top as MotoGP™ pre-season testing continued in Malaysia on Tuesday. Having already locked out all three days of the previous test three weeks ago, the Repsol Honda Team rider and rookie teammate Marc Márquez sandwiched the Yamaha Factory Racing bike of world champion Jorge Lorenzo. The majority of the field was again frustrated by inclement weather.
The day started off dry at Sepang but rain after 2:30pm local time resulted in much of the pack waiting in their garages. Pedrosa, who had aimed for a long stint and is now targeting that goal on Wednesday, topped the timesheets with his 2:01.580 lap time.
“Today we continued trying things out with the bike here in Sepang, focusing most of all on suspension,” Pedrosa said. “We also worked a little on the electronics. The track wasn’t 100 percent after the rainfall from the past few days, but we were able to ride well. In the afternoon it rained again, and we used this to perform some laps in the wet. Tomorrow we will continue with the work that we have scheduled.”
Valentino Rossi had also intended for efficient race-distance runs but will also have to wait, having placed his Yamaha fifth.
The conditions confirmed that LCR Honda MotoGP’s Stefan Bradl was fourth overall, continuing to analyze the two setup options he first tried at the earlier test. With his best dry time just 17 thousandths of a second slower than the slowest factory Honda racer, less than a second covered the top seven; that particular group was rounded out by Monster Yamaha Tech 3’s Cal Crutchlow and GO&FUN Honda Gresini’s Álvaro Bautista, with British rookie Bradley Smith ending the day firmly inside the top 10.
Ducati Team also saw both of its runners finish inside the top 10, as Andrea Dovizioso and 2006 world champion Nicky Hayden managed eighth and ninth positions. The Audi-owned squad grabbed attention early on as it rolled out its machines with brand-new fuel tanks.
Further down the order, test riders from all three factory outfits worked on an assortment of programmes, with Katsayuki Nakasuga and Waturu Yoshikawa pairing up for Yamaha while Ducati ran Michele Pirro and Honda Takumi Takahashi.
At Ignite Pramac Racing Team, Ben Spies fought to 13th place as he continued to battle a shoulder injury, whereas teammate Andrea Iannone evaluated two engines in order to assess the weight distribution of his Energy T.I. Pramac Racing Team machine.
Once again, the Power Electronics Aspar of Aleix Espargaró set the pace in the CRT class, escaping a minor incident at turn one when the ART had slid away from the Spaniard. Teammate Randy de Puniet was 18th, completing 22 laps in comparison with Espargaró’s 28.
Racking up most mileage was the aforementioned Hayden’s factory Ducati, as the American completed 46 tours.
Seventeenth fastest, Hiroshi Aoyama was the leading Avintia Blusens representative on their FTR CRT bike, with teammate Héctor Barberá seven places further back.
Having switched from a Suter BMW to an FTR Kawasaki for 2013, Colin Edwards’ day finished in 20th position for NGM Mobile Forward Racing, edging out Came IodaRacing Project’s Danilo Petrucci and Cardion AB Motoracing’s Karel Abraham, who this year has switched to a CRT from a prototype satellite bike.
The field was completed by Claudio Corti on the second Forward Racing machine, plus Gresini’s Bryan Staring and Ioda’s Lukáš Pešek. Just ahead of this trio was the Paul Bird Motorsport ART of Yonny Hernandez, although teammate Michael Laverty was unable to run on the new in-house PBM bike as the team continued to install the Magneti Marelli ECU.
This week’s second of three days begins at 10:00am local time on Wednesday. Should the weather pattern threaten to be the same as Tuesday, teams may be forced to modify their plans in order to make best use of a dry circuit.
Day 1 Results
1. Dani Pedrosa ESP Repsol Honda (RC213V) 2m 1.580s (Lap 17/43)
2. Jorge Lorenzo ESP Yamaha Factory (YZR-M1) 2m 1.815s (14/25)
3. Marc Marquez ESP Repsol Honda (RC213V) 2m 1.942s (17/23)
4. Stefan Bradl GER LCR Honda (RC213V) 2m 1.959s (24/38)
5. Valentino Rossi ITA Yamaha Factory (YZR-M1) 2m 2.028s (19/25)
6. Cal Crutchlow GBR Yamaha Tech 3 (YZR-M1) 2m 2.272s (5/28)
7. Alvaro Bautista ESP Honda Gresini (RC213V) 2m 2.362s (27/32)
8. Andrea Dovizioso ITA Ducati Team (GP13) 2m 2.801s (16/22)
9. Nicky Hayden USA Ducati Team (GP13) 2m 3.143s (37/46)
10. Bradley Smith GBR Yamaha Tech 3 (YZR-M1) 2m 3.632s (24/24)
11. Katsayuki Nakasuga JPN Yamaha Test Rider (YZR-M1) 2m 3.734s (23/24)
12. Aleix Espargaro ESP Aspar (ART CRT) 2m 3.941s (27/28)
13. Ben Spies USA Pramac Racing (GP13) 2m 4.047s (24/25)
14. Andrea Iannone ITA Pramac Racing (GP13) 2m 4.050s (29/32)
15. Wataru Yoshikawa JPN Yamaha Test Rider (YZR-M1) 2m 4.590s (11/23)
16. Michele Pirro ITA Ducati Test Rider (GP13) 2m 4.626s (24/38)
17. Hiroshi Aoyama JPN Avintia (FTR-Kawasaki CRT)* 2m 4.743s (29/30)
18. Randy De Puniet FRA Aspar (ART CRT) 2m 5.288s (9/22)
19. Takumi Takahashi JPN Honda Test Rider (RC213V) 2m 5.510s (21/34)
20. Colin Edwards USA Forward Racing (FTR-Kawasaki CRT)* 2m 5.518s (17/21)
21. Danilo Petrucci ITA IodaRacing (Suter-BMW CRT)* 2m 5.827s (19/35)
22. Karel Abraham CZE Cardion AB (ART CRT) 2m 5.838s (15/26)
23. Yonny Hernandez COL Paul Bird Motorsport (ART CRT) 2m 5.908s (18/29)
24. Hector Barbera ESP Avintia (FTR-Kawasaki CRT)* 2m 6.062s (27/30)
25. Claudio Corti ITA Forward Racing (FTR-Kawasaki CRT)* 2m 6.306s (21/26)
26. Bryan Staring AUS Honda Gresini (FTR-Honda CRT) 2m 6.730s (24/34)
27. Lukas Pesek CZE IodaRacing (Suter-BMW CRT)* 2m 7.991s (20/25)
* Control ECU.
–From motogp.com
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