Today’s first day of practice for the British Grand Prix saw some typical English weather. In the sky there were clouds, just a little sunshine but no rain despite the weather forecast! In the morning session Andrea Dovizioso showed that he would be a force to be reckoned with, having a good pace with the leaders and ending the session in fourth place. In the afternoon the JiR Team Scot rider worked hard on tyre choice, testing all the various materials that Michelin brought for him, as he prepared for the practice and qualifying sessions of tomorrow. The final position in the afternoon does not show Andrea’s potential and both team and rider are confident to find the right pace for the race.
Gianluca Montiron – Team Director: “This was our first important day in the UK to understand which direction will work for us to be competitive for tomorrow and Sunday. Lap times in the morning were very good and the team did some very important work to find the solutions to give a constant pace to put Andrea in the position to be very competitive. Now it will be very important to analyse the data recorded today, to allow us to put Andrea in the position to be strong for tomorrow and the race.”
Andrea Dovizioso, 13th, 1’29”722: “Obviously I’m not satisfied with the final position but I am optimistic because with hard work we’ll go quicker tomorrow and we obviously can do a better pace in race configuration and I do think that we can find all the solutions we need to be competitive. We did a good lap time in the morning and in the afternoon our approach was different as we looked at the right tyre choice to make between the Michelin material I had at my disposal. We also tried something in case the weather conditions would change. It is also necessary to find the right balance of the bike and to find rear stability and get the bike efficient in corner speed. I have also to work on the overall rhythm, as the layout of racetrack is very particular, with part of the track fast and another part very narrow and start/stop which breaks the rhythm a little.”  Dovisiso's motogp debut at Donington Gianni Berti – Technical Co-ordinator: “The whole day has been focussed on the race and the choice of the tyre for the race. We want to test the different solutions that Michelin bring here for us and make our decision in order to be ready with the right set-up tomorrow. Weather conditions were a little strange today, with a big difference in temperature, which makes the tyres work in a different way. The target is to be consistent in our pace and this will be the target of tomorrow’s work, followed by some final tuning.”
Kawasaki’s John Hopkins and Anthony West finished today’s opening practice sessions at Donington Park in a confident mood, after improvements to their machine set-up saw them finish in 11th and 12th positions respectively.
Hopkins bravely ended the day’s proceedings just a fraction of a second outside of the top ten, despite suffering from the discomfort of a back injury sustained in practice at Catalunya. The 25-year-old Anglo-American wisely used today’s dry track time to run through various Bridgestone race tyre combinations ahead of tomorrow’s qualifying session, which is predicted to be wet.
Hopkins remains confident that, with the progress made during the post-race test in Spain, and the successful practice sessions today, he can qualify well at the 4.023km Donington Park circuit tomorrow with just minor adjustments to the chassis of his Ninja ZX-RR.
West completed the day just over two tenths of a second behind his teammate in a promising 12th position. Following a recent test in Japan, the Australian has altered the settings of his Kawasaki, which has significantly improved the stability and rear traction of his race machine on corner exit.
The 26-year-old Kawasaki pilot is aware that there is still further progress to be made, but already West feels more confident after the two hour-long sessions today, and is aiming for a return to the top ten in qualifying.
John Hopkins, #21 - 11th - 1'29.441: “This circuit is quite demanding and it’s pretty tough on my back injury. I’m having trouble lifting my leg and shifting through the gears in the tight, quick changes of direction. It’s a fight, but we’re working through it and the bike feels really good. We’ve got a few areas to improve on the chassis, but the post-race test at Catalunya has definitely proven positive. We ran through different tyre options today to see what would be a good race tyre in the dry, as the weather is quite unpredictable and we’re not sure what the conditions will be like tomorrow. We have a few changes to make to the machine overnight, but I’m confident we can step it up a gear and we’ll be working hard to qualify well here.”
Anthony West, #13 - 12th - 1'29.666: “Finally I can say that we’ve managed to make a real step forward with the rear traction problems we have suffered with for so long. The recent test in Japan was positive and this has been proven on the track today, as we’re not so far off the pace. The setting we have found does mean the bike now wheelies more, however this is much easier to deal with than not being able to exit the turns. We still need to improve the first part of corner exit, but the rear is gripping much better and driving forward out of the turns rather than spinning so much, which means it feels a lot more controllable and stable than previously. I hope that this improvement can be reflected on qualifying rubber tomorrow, and although there is still a lot of work to do, I feel confident that we are heading in the right direction.”
Naoya Kaneko, Kawasaki Technical Manager: “Both riders have made improvements in testing recently but there is still a lot of work to do. With John we need to work on the set-up of the front-end of his bike so he has more confidence going into the turns, whereas with Anthony we need to further improve the rear traction of his machine during corner exit. We have made steps forward, and John is working hard despite suffering from an injury, but if we are to be competitive we still need to significantly reduce the time gap between us and the top of the time sheets.”
 Stoner's smile is back with the fastest time. The threat of rain held off at Donington to allow Casey Stoner and Marco Melandri to make full use of the first free practice sessions for the British Grand Prix. The Australian was the fastest man on track in both, taking advantage of improvements made with the electronics of his GP8 during tests at Barcelona last week. Melandri found a promising set-up and is looking forward to refining it tomorrow after lapping fourteenth fastest.
Casey Stoner, 1st - 1'28.253: "I'm really pleased with today. In the past few rounds we've had trouble getting power to the ground - every time I opened the throttle the bike wanted to buck and that made the chassis look a lot worse than it really was. The bike has never been slow and we've been running for podiums, which isn't bad, but we always felt there was something missing. In the Barcelona test we tried something with the electronics that both Vitto (Guareschi) and myself really liked straight away. It is great to see that the improvement has transferred here to Donington and I believe there is still more to come yet. I'm not sure if this change to the electronics will have such a major effect in wet conditions because that is more to do with adapting your set-up to get weight on the rear but we already have a good wet setting anyway so I'm confident we can be competitive whatever the weather decides to do. I'm pleased that the circuit organisers have done some work to combat the terrible grip here from last year. To be honest in some areas it is a lot better than last year whilst in other patches it's just as bad, but overall I think they've done a pretty good job."  Marco Melandri, 14th - 1'29.856: "This weekend as started out in a more positive fashion. We started with two similar bikes, both with a fairly good setting and we continued to work by making small changes and testing tyres. We found something that worked well so I'm quite happy. We hope that the weather stays favourable tomorrow so that we can continue working. Track conditions were good today, they've 'roughed up' a couple of sections that were slippery and there are less bumps. The grip seems fine to me and it's good to say that we can at least compete in dry conditions. I remember last year that in the wet it got really slippery but we'll have to wait and see what happens if it rains tomorrow."
Ben Spies made his Rizla Suzuki MotoGP debut at Donington Park in England today and settled into his new environment quickly, showing a marked improvement in his times during today’s two free practice sessions.
Spies (1’30.766, 58 laps) is deputising for the injured Loris Capirossi at the British Grand Prix and the two-time AMA Superbike Champion spent the majority of the day learning the 4,023m English track. Spies knocked over a second off his lap-times between the morning and afternoon sessions as he finished the day in 17th place on the timesheets. He is confident of improving tomorrow and will be trying to move further up the standings.
Chris Vermeulen made a strong start to the Donington weekend and topped the timesheets a number of times during the two sessions, working with his crew to further develop the Suzuki GSV-R using some of the data gathered from the recent Catalunya test. Vermeulen completed a long run on a set of Bridgestone race tyres in the afternoon session and was pleased with the results. His best time of 1’29.410 from his 57 laps gave him ninth position on the leaderboard. Today’s fastest time was set by Casey Stoner on his factory Ducati.
Rizla Suzuki MotoGP has one more free practice session tomorrow morning followed by an hour of qualifying in the afternoon. Sunday’s 30-lap race is round eight of the season and the event gets underway at 15.00hrs local time (14.00GMT).
Chris Vermeulen: “At least we got a full dry today at Donington, as the weather forecast had been a bit hit and miss as to whether it would rain. We tried a lot of different things with the bike today, most of which we learnt from the Barcelona test and it seems to be helping the machine around here. I’ve lapped consistently today and I kept in a set of tyres for most of this afternoon’s session, and with over twenty laps on them I put in my best time of the day – which was also quicker than my qualifying time here last year! So it seems we have taken a big step here with the GSV-R, but we still have a few things to try tomorrow, both chassis and engine wise to make the bike work better. If we can get a little bit more pace I think we can jump in front of a few riders.”  Ben Spies may not be faster than them, but he sure is happy to be there. Ben Spies: “I’m not used to being this far back in the field, but with what we are trying to achieve here this weekend I’ve got to be pleased with how it has gone today. This is the first time I’ve been on this bike and the first time I’ve ever been to Donington, so realistically only being about a second off a decent pace is pretty good. I feel we can be competitive if we can get more dry time and every time we have gone out we’ve knocked off a second, so if we continue with that we’ll be good. I’m getting more comfortable on the bike and it’s working great, the crew have been real good and it’s me right now that needs to learn the track a bit more every time out. Hopefully it will come good tomorrow and we’ll be able to get up and into the middle of the pack!”
Paul Denning – Team Manager: “Luckily the weather has been kind today and we have been able to get through some valuable preparation work for Sunday’s race. Chris has been pushing hard from the start and has been very consistent, but he is also a bit frustrated that he hasn’t been able to go quicker. That said, his best times have come on tyres that have done over 20 laps and that is a good sign for the race. Now if we can find a bit more rear grip and make the bike easier to ride in certain sections of the track, there is without question a fair bit more to come from him. He has his race-face on and nothing less than challenging for the podium is going to satisfy him this weekend!
“In the team’s opinion Ben’s performance today has been outstanding! We have to remember he only rode the 2007 GSV-R for about two hours at Valencia in November last year, and that Donington Park is completely new to him. Learning a new racetrack is one thing, but learning to ride a new machine with different tyres on a new racetrack is another thing altogether - and pretty difficult to do as well! To get into the 1’30s on the first day is a fantastic achievement and he is serious about going a fair bit faster still, and we are really looking forward to hopefully getting more dry time tomorrow to see how fast he can go!”
After a weekend of break, MotoGP is back in action for the eight round of the 2008 World Championship at Donington Park circuit, in England. Alice Team riders haven’t begun in the best way, even if after the two days of test completed last week in Barcelona, they have shown improvements. The Spanish rider, Toni Elias, has also been unlucky today: in the afternoon session he had to stop in the garage for some minutes due to some technical problems. Back on track in the last minutes of the second free practice, he made it to improve his best morning lap time by almost a second, concluding the day in fifteenth position. His teammate, Sylvain Guintoli, didn’t make it to take a big step forward in the second hour of work, concluding the day in eighteenth position.
Fabiano Sterlacchini – Technical director: “The situation is the same we found in the last test in Barcelona: with high temperature we can be competitive, but when we find “cold” tracks the problems we have become even bigger, complicating our work of set up of the bike. Today, in addition, we had a technical problem that blocked us for a while in the afternoon. We are checking the situation, but it seems like we lost some oil: probably a stone hit the radiator making a small hole.”  Spainards on track - Toni and Dani Toni Elias – 15th: “The low temperatures didn’t allow us to be as fast as we were during the test in Barcelona, when temperatures were much higher. Despite this we have worked a lot constantly improving our lap times. I can’t be satisfied by my position at the moment, but if tomorrow we will find the same weather conditions I believe I can improve a lot and conquer a good position on the starting grid.”
Sylvain Guintoli – 18th: “We have found a good base to start with in the morning, but then things didn’t go as we expected. I have the most difficulties in the fast turns when I have to change direction of the bike. We have to find the right balance of the bike to allow me to be much more agile. Unluckily this is a completely different circuit compared to the last two where we have raced, Mugello and Montmelň, and therefore we have to work intensively to adapt the bike to this track.”
Valentino Rossi, who is scheduled to contest his 200th Grand Prix on Sunday, got his weekend off to a solid start today by finishing third overall in the first free practice sessions at Donington Park. The 29-year-old Fiat Yamaha Team rider, whose first ever 125cc race was back in 1996 at Shah Alam, has an illustrious record at this circuit with eight wins to his name, including two with Yamaha in 2004 and 2005.
Rossi started off steadily this morning, finishing the first session in eighth as he struggled to perfect his set-up to suit the tricky Donington surface. In the later stages of the afternoon session the Bridgestone-shod Italian and his crew improved things somewhat, finding a better setting which gave them more grip and finishing the day third in the combined standings, behind Casey Stoner and Nicky Hayden.
Valentino Rossi - 3rd, 1'28.909: "This morning we were struggling and we're not in perfect shape yet. Fortunately however, this afternoon on the last run things improved a lot and we are now third. The main problem here is the asphalt because it doesn't have any grip anymore and riding on it is very difficult. Of course the temperature was quite low, which didn't help, but in some parts of the track the asphalt is finished. It's a pity because this track is great, one of my favourites! We have to hope that the weather stays dry because if it's wet it will be even worse. We have a couple of ideas to try tomorrow; we will try some different tyres and also some other solutions for the setting, in order to be faster in the direction changes. We had a very long meeting after the session in order to try to understand the problem, it's very strange because we used some tyres which are usually very good for us, but here they don't seem to work as they normally do. Third position is okay however, we're not so far from the top and tomorrow we will try to make some more steps forward."
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Davide Brivio - Team Manager: "We definitely improved this afternoon, as the times show, but we still have a lot of work to do on a few things specifically. Tomorrow we need to focus on improving the setting still further to suit this track; the surface here isn't great and the lack of grip makes it quite difficult to find the right set-up. We also need to do some more work on the tyres with Bridgestone before we're in a position to make a choice. Luckily it was dry today so now we hope the English weather is going to be kind to us again tomorrow so that we can continue with what we started this afternoon."
Two weeks after crashing during practice in Catalunya and ruling himself out of his home race, Jorge Lorenzo made a welcome return to the track on his Fiat Yamaha M1 at the British Grand Prix today. After his sensational start to the season, the youngest rider on the grid has undergone a torrid time since fracturing both his ankles in China at the start of May and he is now riding with a special glove on his right hand to protect the skin graft that he underwent 12 days ago.
Lorenzo's focus today was simply to find the feeling back on board his bike and to build his confidence, which he freely admits has suffered in his recent string of crashes. The Michelin rider finished the day a lowly 16th in the combined standings but is looking forward to feeling more relaxed and confident tomorrow and trying to improve things step-by-step.
Jorge Lorenzo - 16th, 1'30.290: "Today was always going to be a hard day for me and I had to start very slowly because honestly I felt some fear after all of my problems! I haven't ridden since the crash in practice in Catalunya and I have lost some confidence, so the aim this weekend is just to find it again. Today the main target was to try to find my feeling with the bike and also to check my physical shape, which is okay although I do have some pain in my hand and finger where I had the skin graft. I am happy to be back however and I hope that the worst is over and that tomorrow I will be more relaxed and have more confidence. We are starting from scratch again this weekend so we have to go step-by-step and take things slowly."
 Lorenzo cautious after his injury filled Catalunya race Daniele Romagnoli - Team Manager: "Finally we have Jorge back after Barcelona and we're very pleased about this! Now we are just looking to re-build his confidence by taking things gently and easily, without risking too much. For sure he will need some time before he is back to his best but there is no pressure on him. Meanwhile we also need to work hard on improving the bike setting because we are lacking some rear grip and the bike is quite nervous at full lean. Together with Michelin we will analyse the data tonight and study some solutions to help us with this tomorrow."
Tech 3 Yamaha team pairing Colin Edwards and James Toseland made an encouraging start to the British GP at Donington Park, both clocking top ten times at the end of the first day of free practice.
Edwards showed why Donington is the track where he's enjoyed the most success in his MotoGP career as he clocked the fourth best time overall. Edwards has claimed four top six finishes at Donington and he was third fastest this morning despite small issues with the gearing on his Tech 3 Yamaha YZR-M1. Edwards held second until the closing stages this afternoon and a best lap of 1.28.969 clinched fourth as the American spent the opening day evaluating Michelin tyres and a new rear shock from Ohlins.
Making his MotoGP debut at his home track, Toseland was able to immediately post competitive and consistent lap times, which only got faster as he honed the set-up of his YZR-M1 to suit the challenging Donington layout. Toseland set a best time of 1.29.341, confident with more time on the new set-up that he will be able to fight for a front row position in tomorrow's crucial qualifying session.
Toseland will unveil a special one-off paint-scheme for his home race tomorrow, having given fans a glimpse today of what to expect with a St George's flag on the front and rear of his YZR-M1 machine. A crowd of close to 80,000 is expected to flock to the East Midlands to see Toseland's eagerly anticipated British GP debut. Today's action was run under dry but cloudy skies, with forecasts predicting heavy rain for tomorrow.
Colin Edwards - 4th, 1'28.969: "I'm reasonably happy because I didn't get in many quality laps this morning. I either caught traffic or the bike wasn't quite right but this afternoon we made a change to the gearing and I felt good right away. This year the rev limiter is different on the bike so we had to make a change to alter that. When you've come here for a few years you know what the revs are in certain corners and when to change and you don't have to think about it. But I wasn't sure if I was going down one too many gears or going up one too less because the gearbox was a bit out. We got the gearbox sorted and with some electronics the grip got better and better and Michelin have done a fantastic job. Every tyre I put in it seems to work and this will probably be the only time all year where I could use three tyres in the race on Sunday. Credit to Michelin because they have done an amazing job. This afternoon I did some more laps on a tyre that I'd already done 22 laps on and I was only two-tenths slower than my best lap so we are in great shape.
Minus the Australian I'm happy because Casey has been impressive and we've got to work something out to get closer to him. But the rear shock from Ohlins I really liked. It's not often you get a new suspension piece and throw it in and it works. Usually you have to tinker with it and work out what springs work with it, but it feels great. It just keeps the rear planted more on the entry and it is not pitching weight to the front as hard. So braking is better and mid-corner it feels like there is no speed limit. You can brake harder because the rear tyre stays consistently in the same position."  James Toseland hoping for a good article at home James Toseland - 8th, 1'29.341: "The times are very close but unfortunately I found it difficult with the setting we had from the Catalunya test that I thought would work. I came away from that test with a lot of confidence but the settings don't work here. We tried to persevere with it but it was the wrong direction and at the end we made a change and it was night and day different. At least now we are moving the right way. I'm really comfortable doing low 29s but with the Catalunya setting I couldn't enter the corner. I didn't have the contact with the rear and that was losing me a lot of corner speed. Around this track you have to keep it fast and flowing and I couldn't keep my momentum up. I'm sure I can get it in the 28s and it looks like that will be the race pace so we have got to find a bit more. But with more time on the new setting I'm confident we can improve because we found it a bit too late to really dial it in.
I'm pleased to be in the ballpark, but obviously not pleased with eighth but I don't think that is a reflection on where we could and should have been. It is quite a bit different riding at this track on an 800 that what I did last year in World Superbikes. I tried my old lines but they don't work! The speed is just so much faster and that determines the corner speed you carry. Using my old lines I couldn't square the corner off, so even though I know the track I have to learn and adjust. The support for me out there is amazing with all the JT flags and 52 flags. I think everybody wants to see a British guy do well, so it's just down to me to get the job done." |
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