Yamaha, Ducati, Honda in First Practice Session
For the first time with all the bikes on the track on the same day, Alex Barros showed that his pattern of dominating the off-season test sessions is not a fluke. In spite of cool conditions (air temp 12C, track temp 19C, humidity 56%) and a session cut short by afternoon rain showers, he put his Yamaha M1 at the top of the charts one again, with a time well under Max Biaggi's qualifying record, and almost 1-1/2 seconds under Rossi's fastest race lap from last year.
Perhaps even more surprising is that Loris Capirossi put his Ducati in a close second, ahead of the fastest Hondas of Sete Gibernau and Valentino Rossi. Sete's 3rd place itself is a bit of a surprise, but less so once you realize that this is his home track.
A few riders were obviously not riding at their expected levels -- in some cases because they were not familiar with the track, but this does not explain all the slow times. Max Biaggi, who has raced there frequently, was way down in 14th spot, behind both Suzukis and Tamada's Bridgestone-shod RCV, and barely ahead of Hoffman's and Pitt's Kawasakis.
Colin Edwards, who had never seen the track until today, was 13th quickest. Troy Bayliss, who first saw the track on Thursday, was 22nd and Nicky Hayden was 24th, 2.8 seconds off Barros pace. In typical fashion, Nicky put in the most laps (62)
In addition, Capirossi obliterated the old top speed mark of 317 km/h set by Ukawa on his RCV last year, with a radar clocked speed of 325.9 km/h (202 mph). Troy Bayliss set the second highest top speed of 322.4 km/h (200mph). Clearly, the Ducatis are not lacking in power!
As an indication of how far the bar has been raised, the fastest 16 bikes (in top speed)today were faster than the old record. Interestingly, aside from Capi, the riders with the quickest lap times were generally well down in top speeds -- Barros was 14th and Sete was 16th. Also interesting is that the Suzukis and Kawasakis were among the fastest in top speed, suggesting that their problem is not a shortage of horsepower.
The tests continue tomorrow (Sunday) with another free session in the morning, then the special 1 hour qualifying session in the afternood (1400-1500 CET -- 8:00-9:00 EST), followed by a final free session.
To see more on the tests,
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