MotoGP 2009 - Round One

MotoGP 2009 - Round One - Day One

The 2007 World Champion Casey Stoner started the Commercial bank Grand Prix of Qatar weekend and the new season ahead of his rivals, in the first MotoGP free practice session of the year at the Losail International Circuit on Friday evening.

Despite running off track at one stage, Stoner was in charge from early in the session with his 1’57.053 best time coming on the 12th of his 17 laps and keeping him 0.386s ahead of second fastest rider Valentino Rossi. Australian Ducati Marlboro rider Stoner was the form man of the 2009 preseason and as the winner of the last two MotoGP races at the Qatari track he will take some beating this weekend.

World Champion Rossi was once more the closest man to his young rival Stoner, the Italian registering his quickest time (1’57.439) towards the end of the session. A race winner previously at the desert circuit, the legendary Fiat Yamaha rider will look to start his title defence with another victory on Sunday.

In the first ever Grand Prix free practice session since the introduction of a single tyre rule, a rider who did not use Bridgestone tyres last year -Monster Yamaha Tech3’s Colin Edwards- was third fastest, courtesy of a best time right at the end of the 45-minute practice. He was, however, some 0.782s off Stoner’s pace.

Another rider new to Bridgestone rubber this year, Fiat Yamaha’s Jorge Lorenzo surged up the timesheets with his own last gasp hot lap to finish fourth. The young Spaniard undertaking his second season in the MotoGP class will aim to repeat his 2008 Qatar pole position in qualifying on Saturday night.

Like Lorenzo, San Carlo Honda Gresini’s Alex de Angelis embarks on his second MotoGP campaign this year and he started the weekend well on his satellite RC212V, in fifth place as the fastest Honda rider.

Veteran Italian Loris Capirossi -starting his 20th season in the World Championship- placed sixth on the timesheet on the improved and updated Rizla Suzuki GSV-R, nearly a second and a half behind former team-mate Stoner.

An impressive effort from MotoGP rookie Mika Kallio, meanwhile saw him lap seventh quickest as he continued his adaptation to premier class riding with his new team Pramac Racing. Andrea Dovizioso gets his big break with Repsol Honda this season and he started his first GP weekend on factory machinery in eighth place overall. Next on the timesheets were Marco Melandri, on the Ninja ZX-RR in the new Hayate Racing team set-up, and LCR Honda rider Randy de Puniet rounded off the top ten.

James Toseland (Tech 3 Yamaha) just missed out on the top ten as he continued his recovery from some big preseason crashes, whilst 2006 World Champion Nicky Hayden was down in thirteenth place as he commenced his first race weekend with Ducati Marlboro.

Dani Pedrosa was back on track, albeit riding through the pain barrier following knee and wrist injuries. He was returning to action after missing the Jerez Official Test as a result of a heavy crash in testing at Losail just over a month ago. The Repsol Honda rider lapped 4.382s off the pace, completing 17 important laps but ending the session last on the timesheet.

1 Casey STONER AUS Ducati Marlboro Team Ducati 1'57.053 328.967
2 Valentino ROSSI ITA Fiat Yamaha Team Yamaha 1'57.439 327.471 0.386
3 Colin EDWARDS USA Monster Yamaha Tech 3 Yamaha 1'57.835 322.677 0.782
4 Jorge LORENZO SPA Fiat Yamaha Team Yamaha 1'58.272 326.579 1.219
5 Alex DE ANGELIS RSM San Carlo Honda Gresini Honda 1'58.452 326.975 1.399
6 Loris CAPIROSSI ITA Rizla Suzuki MotoGP Suzuki 1'58.468 323.643 1.415
7 Mika KALLIO FIN Pramac Racing Ducati 1'58.499 328.367 1.446
8 Andrea DOVIZIOSO ITA Repsol Honda Team Honda 1'58.506 325.693 1.453
9 Marco MELANDRI ITA Hayate Racing Team Kawasaki 1'58.757 324.812 1.704
10 Randy DE PUNIET FRA LCR Honda MotoGP Honda 1'58.771 321.332 1.718
11 James TOSELAND GBR Monster Yamaha Tech 3 Yamaha 1'58.850 320.000 1.797
12 Toni ELIAS SPA San Carlo Honda Gresini Honda 1'59.094 327.471 2.041
13 Nicky HAYDEN USA Ducati Marlboro Team Ducati 1'59.158 324.519 2.105
14 Chris VERMEULEN AUS Rizla Suzuki MotoGP Suzuki 1'59.348 316.437 2.295
15 Yuki TAKAHASHI JPN Scot Racing Team MotoGP Honda 1'59.437 319.621 2.384
16 Sete GIBERNAU SPA Grupo Francisco Hernando Ducati 2'00.595 323.547 3.542
17 Niccolo CANEPA ITA Pramac Racing Ducati 2'00.597 317.927 3.544
18 Dani PEDROSA SPA Repsol Honda Team Honda 2'01.435 326.876 4.382

-- Ducati Report

At half past ten local time this evening and with track temperatures still touching 25ºC, the MotoGP riders took to the Losail Circuit in Qatar for the first official free practice of the 2009 MotoGP World Championship.

Casey Stoner quickly established himself as the pacesetter in the single 45-minute session, finding a good early feeling for his Desmosedici GP9 despite a slippery track surface caused by sand that had caught up in the light evening breeze and blown across the circuit from the neighbouring desert.

The reduced practice time, which has been cut back this year from two sessions of an hour each on the opening day, made life tough for Stoner’s new team-mate Nicky Hayden, who suffered a problem with a sensor on one bike and then a clutch problem on both machines.

CASEY STONER (Ducati Marlboro Team) 1st (1’57.053)
"We've made a good start today and I'm happy because the bike feeling was really good straight away. The settings we brought from Jerez seem to be working well here too. We still need to change a couple of things to get more grip from the rear. A lot of that is due to the track conditions being really dusty but we just need to take our time and try to get it set up better for tomorrow. Hopefully the track will clean up too."

NICKY HAYDEN – (Ducati Marlboro Team) 13th (1’59.158)
“Today wasn’t a great day. To start with I had a problem with a sensor on my first bike and I had to come back after just three laps of my first run and change to my second bike. The set-up wasn’t the same and the clutch wasn’t quite right. The 45 minutes flew by and we weren’t able to get back on the pace we set here in the test. Obviously I’m going to need both sessions tomorrow to work something out and get on the pace. Casey and Valentino are already looking really quick but we’re not too far off the group behind them. Hopefully with the right changes to the bike tomorrow we can get amongst them.”

-- Repsol HRC

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 secs, 17 laps, 91 km.
“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 secs, 16 laps, 86 km.
“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.”

-- Yamaha Report

The long-awaited first round of the 2009 MotoGP World Championship finally got underway in Qatar tonight, with Fiat Yamaha riders Valentino Rossi and Jorge Lorenzo making a promising start to their weekend by finishing second and fourth. Tech 3 Yamaha rider Colin Edwards was third, making it three Yamaha’s in the top four under the floodlights of the Losail International Circuit.

With the first Friday practice session now cancelled and all other sessions cut to 45 minutes, it was a strange first ‘day’ for the riders but the Yamaha duo made the most of the shortened time to adapt to the night time conditions and fine-tune the base settings they found during the test here last month, with conditions much warmer this time around. Rossi was fast from the outset, finishing 0.386 seconds off leader Casey Stoner, whilst Lorenzo took a little longer to find his rhythm but put in a fast lap at the end to jump up the order.

The M1’s of Rossi and Lorenzo ran a new logo for the first time tonight for Official Sponsor Packard Bell, which had its global unveiling this morning. The Packard Bell brand means cutting-edge design, style, the ability to understand trends and to enliven desire with creativity. The new red colour and rounded edges fit perfectly with the MotoGP world, evoking competitive spirit, style and trends.

Rossi - Position: 2nd Time: 1'57.439 Laps: 18
“This evening I am quite happy because at the test we were one second from Casey but now the gap is much less. We had some ideas after the test to improve our pace and I am happy to say that they all seemed to have worked. I am fast, I have a good pace and I am happy with this opening session. We can still improve; the track was quite dirty tonight so I think that tomorrow we will be able to push a bit harder. It’s much warmer than at the test and this is helping us too, I am more confident and I can ride my M1 how I want to. It’s strange only having 45 minutes in a session and you have to be quite well organised and plan more in advance, but on the whole it doesn’t seem so bad to me. This weekend I have a special sticker on my bike, which says ‘Forza Abruzzo.’ It’s a message from us for the people of Abruzzo, where the earthquake was last weekend. It’s not so far from my home in Tavullia and I want them to know that we are with them at such a terrible time.”

Lorenzo - Position: 4th Time: 1'58.272 Laps: 18
“We had a few problems, mainly in the hard braking areas where I didn’t have such a great feeling with the front tyre, but apart from that it’s been ok. The track was quite dirty so it was difficult to go at 100%, and I think tomorrow it will be much better. At the end today we made a big improvement and my last lap was much better, so I am not worried and I think tomorrow, with more time on track, we can improve. 45 minutes doesn’t feel enough to me but I do understand the reason for this change; if it helps the championship then it’s important and we just need to get used to this new way of working. The track should be much less dirty as well tomorrow so I hope we can start from where we finished tonight and keep going.”

Rossi's Team Manager
“It was a good practice tonight because we’ve taken what we learnt here during the test and at Jerez and made some good improvements to our base setting. Now we just need to continue to work in the same way and stay as close as possible to the top. It was the first time with just one Friday session, our aim was to ensure we used the reduced time as well as possible and I think we achieved this.”

Lorenzo's Team Manager
“Tonight was not so bad, although it will take some time to get used to the new, short practice! It’s quite hard for Jorge as well because he generally likes to do quite a lot of laps. We had a few issues in the hard braking and some understeer into the turns but we improved at the end. Also the track conditions were not perfect which didn’t help, but we’re positive for tomorrow.”

-- Suzuki Report

Rizla Suzuki MotoGP racer Loris Capirossi began his 20th season in Grand Prix racing by recording the sixth fastest time at Losail in Qatar this evening.

Capirossi (1'58.468, 17 laps) used a new setting in his Suzuki GSV-R today, which was completely different to the set-up he used at the recent test in Qatar. He found a few useful things in the new configuration and with that - along with the previous data - will try to obtain the best set-up for tomorrow's qualifying and race day.

Chris Vermeulen (P14, 1'59.348, 17 laps) and Capirossi both used the softer option compound front tyres for the duration of the session in order to save their allocation of the harder tyre for the remainder of the weekend. Vermeulen was pleased with how the session went considering he didn't use his favoured compound.

Today saw the new rules for MotoGP come into force, with only one session on the first day and that has been reduced to 45 minutes, from the hour that was available last year. It was also the first time that that the single control tyre came into operation, with all riders now using Bridgestone rubber and restricted to only eight front tyres (four of each compound) and 12 rears (six of each) for the whole weekend.

This evening track and air temperatures were both in the mid 20ºCs and a strong wind made conditions quite difficult as the fine desert sand blew onto the circuit. Casey Stoner on his factory Ducati set the quickest time.

Rizla Suzuki has one more practice session - also of 45 minutes - early tomorrow evening, followed by a qualifying session of the same duration later on. Sunday's opening race of the 2009 season will get underway at 23.00hrs local time (20.00hrs GMT).

Loris Capirossi:
"For the first practice it was not too bad, but we did struggle a bit with the setting. In the recent test it was not perfect so we tried a new one and this didn't work as well so we will use some stuff from that and go back to the old one. We have a good idea what we need to modify tomorrow and I am sure we will be stronger. 45 minutes seems a really short time and it is difficult to get a lot of work done, also with the limited amount of tyres - especially on such a dirty track - made it quite tough Overall we are quite pleased and we will have quite an easy way to improve tomorrow!"

Chris Vermeulen:
"It was not really the start to the weekend that we wanted. We have a limit on tyres and didn't really want to use any of the hard front tyres that we will be using for racing. We tried to make the softer one work and we were going not too bad in the beginning of session, but at the end I kept the front tyre in and there was a lot of movement in the front of the bike and struggled to keep corner speed up. It was a bit frustrating that we couldn't go as fast as we have been round here, but I still have all my hard front tyres left and hopefully the speed will come back when we put that in."

Paul Denning - Team Manager:
"It's been a long time waiting for the start of the season and it all seemed to be over so quickly with only one session and it only being 45 minutes! It means that there needs to be an intense level of work in the time allowed and that is something we will have to adapt to as the season goes on. We didn't achieve what we wanted to this evening in terms of the result, but we are fully aware that the favoured front tyre for both riders wasn't used, so that we could keep enough for tomorrow and race-day. I am sure with the data the guys have collected tonight - and the favoured tyres - we'll be a lot closer to the sharp end tomorrow!"

-- Bridgestone Report

Of the available soft and medium compounds brought to Qatar by Bridgestone, Australian Casey Stoner repeated his strong pre-season form to head the field using medium compound tyres. Behind the number 27 Ducati Team rider, Fiat Yamaha’s Valentino Rossi was second fastest and Colin Edwards finished third for Monster Yamaha Tech3.

Conditions for the 45 minute free practice session were as expected of the Qatari region and remained dry. All riders started the session using the soft compound front and soft compound rear Bridgestone slicks, but due to the sand making the surface very abrasive, experienced graining on the rear tyre after approximately 10 laps. All riders changed to the medium compound Bridgestone rear in the second half of the session, and it was on this tyre that each set their fastest lap.

Only Stoner, Jorge Lorenzo (Fiat Yamaha) and Niccolo Canepa (Pramac Racing) tried the medium compound front tyre, everybody else completing the short session on the soft front slick.

The race is being run one month later than last year, and as a result the temperature for this evening’s free practice was considerably higher for than the same session in 2008. Today’s air temperature was 25 degrees Celsius as opposed 15 degrees seen last season, meaning that the medium compound Bridgestone slick worked better.

The entire MotoGP field took to the track for the session, including the injured Dani Pedrosa who battled limited movement in his knee after surgery last month to finish 4.3 seconds down on Stoner.

Pramac Racing’s Mika Kallio was the highest placed rookie, continuing his strong pre-season form to finish seventh fastest on the satellite Ducati GP9 bike.

The field will next venture on track tomorrow night at 1905hrs for the second free practice session.

Tohru Ubukata - Bridgestone Motorsport – Manager, Motorcycle Race Tyre Development
“We saw higher temperatures today t han last year or during the test in March, so our medium compound tyres worked better. From the test here last month, we expected most teams to choose the medium compound rear this weekend. Only three riders chose the medium front tyre today, but I think that most teams will use medium compound front and rear tyres for the second practice session tomorrow as it is run earlier in the evening so the temperature will be higher again.

“We saw some graining on the soft compound rear tyre as the track surface is very abrasive because of the sand – it is one of elements that makes Qatar a tough circuit for us. We have received good feedback from the medium compound rear though. I expect that after tomorrow’s free practice session the riders will already make their decision about which compounds they will choose for the race.”

-- Minor Categories

Meanwhile, in the 250cc class, former 125cc World Champion Gabor Talmacsi was the quickest rider in his first ever quarter litre category session. Talmacsi led the way by a small margin (0.041s) from second quickest rider Álvaro Bautista (Mapfre Aspar).

It was a good start to Talmacsi’s 250cc adventure and was good news for the Balaton Racing Team for whom he rides this year, under the Aspar group umbrella.

Expected title candidate Bautista, meanwhile, will also be pleased to have started the weekend in good form as he seeks to take maximum advantage of current World Champion Marco Simoncelli’s weakness due to injury.

Simoncelli himself bravely lapped 16 times, a remarkable achievement even if he was 16th on the timesheet and three seconds off the pace, given the surgery he had on Tuesday on the scaphoid bone in his right wrist - which he injured last weekend when motocross training.

Behind Talmacsi and Bautista, Mattia Pasini (Team Toth Aprilia), Hiroshi Aoyama (Scot Racing Team) and Héctor Barberá (Pepe World Team) were also on the pace, lapping within half a second of the Hungarian.

The top ten also featured Ratthapark Wilairot (Thai Honda PTT SAG), Thomas Luthi (Emmi-Caffe Latte), Jules Cluzel (Matteoni Racing), Lukas Pesek (Auto Kelly – CP) and Héctor Faubel (Honda SAG).

At the start of the evening in the 125cc category new Bancaja Aspar team-mates Julián Simón and Bradley Smith opened the weekend on top in the first practice.

As the only rider going under the 2’08 mark, Simón kept up the good work after an excellent preseason, to go round a second faster than any of his rivals with a best effort of 2’07.791 on the 12th of his 14 laps.

Englishman Smith, like his new colleague Simón recruited by Bancaja Aspar over the winter and starting regular action after a strong preseason, was second quickest with a time of 2’08.823s at a circuit where he took pole position last year.

There was plenty of Aspar representation in the top five as Sergio Gadea lapped fifth quickest, behind Nico Terol (Jack & Jones Team) and Marc Marquez (Red Bull KTM Motorsport). Smith was the only non-Spaniard amongst that leading group.

The top ten was completed by Sandro Cortese (Ajo Interwetten), Andrea Iannone (Ongetta I.S.P.A.), Stefan Bradl (Viessmann Kiefer Racing), Pol Espargaró (Derbi Racing Team) and Jonas Folger (Ongetta I.S.P.A.).

It was an incident-free session with no crashes and Folger was the only rider to run into trouble as he briefly left the track at one stage, only to return quickly without problems.

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