Thai MotoGP Test underway | Marquez early pacesetter

MotoGP Test – Buriram – Day One – Halfway Update

Things are already hotting up today as MotoGP riders get their first taste of Chang International Circuit in Thailand and by halfway through the first day track temperatures were already passing 50-degrees celsius.

Pedrosa, Crutchlow, Bautista, Simeon and Rabat had all got a little closer to the Thai tarmac than they would have preferred after all suffering tumbles at various stages of the first four hours of today’s test. Simeon’s off was the biggest but he was still up and okay.

Valentino Rossi has been getting plenty of laps in on what is the nine-time World Champion’s 39th birthday. Rossi is also been in talks with Yamaha about signing on for the following season 2019.

Another man currently in talks regarding next year is regining World Champion Marc Marquez. The Spaniard has gone on the record in that he is keeping his options open and talking to other interested manufacturers but it would seem incredibly unlikely that Honda will allow the most exciting rider in the paddock to be stolen away by another brand.

Jack Miller continued his adaption to the Ducati and would probably be the rider least affected by the stifling heat and humidity after spending the Australian summer in his Townsville home. Miller is seventh fastest thus far.

Well, he would have been the rider least affected by the weather conditions if the recently married Hafizh Syahrin was not there to ride the Tech 3 Yamaha in place of Jonas Folger. Today 23-year-old Syahrin made history by becoming the first Malaysian rider to ever turn a wheel on a MotoGP machine. Halfway through his first day on the MotoGP machine the young Malay rider was understandly at the bottom of the timesheets, 3.129-secs off the Marquez early benchmark.

Chang International Circuit in Buriram, Thailand

The 4.55km circuit looks likely to eventually produce similar lap-times to our own 4.45km Phillip Island circuit and also matches the Australian venue for the numbers of turns, 12 in total. However, while Phillip Island’s turn 12 is one of the fastest and most breathtaking in all of MotoGP, Buriram’s turn 12 is a tricky first gear affair and has already caught out Pedrosa, Crutchlow and Bautista today.

Buriram is about five hours from Bangkok, in the north-east of Thailand.