MOVISTAR YAMAHA MOTOGP CONTINUE DEVELOPMENT ON SECOND TEST DAY IN LOSAIL

2016-03-04 17:07
Movistar Yamaha MotoGP‘s Jorge Lorenzo and Valentino Rossi completed the second of the three days of testing in Qatar today that mark the final official test of the 2016 MotoGP pre-season schedule. The teammates once again put in long hours as they diligently worked on the settings of their bikes and finished the day in third and eighth place respectively.




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Copyrights 2016 Yamaha Motor Racing Srl

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QATAR MOTOGP TEST
Losail, Qatar - 3rd March 2016

TEST


23:00 LOCAL TIME GMT+3 AIR 21°C / TRACK 21°C NIGHT CLEAR / HUMIDITY 81%



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3rd
JORGE LORENZO
1:55.535 / 48 LAPS


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8th
VALENTINO ROSSI
1:55.947 / 56 LAPS





Losail (Qatar), 3rd March 2016

Movistar Yamaha MotoGP riders Jorge Lorenzo and Valentino Rossi were again out on the Losail International circuit in Qatar, putting their 2016 YZR-M1 machines to the test as they continued to look for the ideal balance to use the new Michelin tyres and the new electronics to the fullest.

Despite the dirt gradually clearing from the track, Lorenzo struggled to find traction during today‘s session, though this barely slowed him down. He impressed by setting a fastest lap early on before continuing his hunt for the perfect set up. He completed the second day with a 1‘55.535s lap for third position, less than a tenth of a second from today‘s fastest time.

Teammate Rossi was the first rider to head out on track today and quickly moved to the top of the time sheets. He then turned his focus to testing some new items. As the restrictive tyre allocation didn‘t allow him to do a time attack, he was unable to improve on his best time from yesterday. The Italian settled for eighth position with a fastest lap of 1‘55.947s, a little more than half a second from today‘s leader.

Tomorrow will be the final day of testing for the Movistar Yamaha MotoGP team before the start of the MotoGP season. The crew and riders are looking forward to returning to action and is delighted it will defend its MotoGP Triple Crown with the support from, as of today, more than two million Facebook fans on its official page, facebook.com/yamahamotogp.



The extended imagery from today's test session (day 2) at the Losail International Circuit (Qatar) is available on
www.yamahamotogp.com
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MASSIMO MEREGALLI

MASSIMO MEREGALLI
TEAM DIRECTOR


After some very positive results yesterday, we had some unexpected difficulties today finding grip. It‘s been a different scenario to work with and therefore we mainly focused our attention on the bike‘s setup and the electronics. The quantity of the front tyres was a bit tight for the testing we had originally planned, so instead we mainly worked on the balance of the bike as opposed to doing a time attack. We also tested some new items that were a part of today‘s scheduled testing programme. Tomorrow we will continue to fine-tune the settings based on the results we got today and we will follow this up with a time attack as well as a race simulation.






JORGE LORENZO

JORGE LORENZO


Today it has been a little bit more difficult for us to go faster than yesterday, because the track seemed a little more slippery. We tried many things to solve the electronics and the tyres and, although we didn't make any big improvements, we‘re still in the top three, that‘s a good thing. I also did longer stints to understand the behaviour of the bike after some laps, so I‘m satisfied because I could keep a higher pace during more laps than yesterday.






VALENTINO ROSSI

VALENTINO ROSSI


The second day was OK, I worked a lot and did a lot of laps because we have quite a lot of work to do. In the end my performance was not fantastic in the lap and the position because I‘m a little bit worse compared to yesterday, but in reality we didn‘t do a real time attack because we tried to save some tyres because it‘s important for tomorrow. We don‘t have a lot of tyres, so we're trying to manage. I think tomorrow will be very important for trying to understand our potential in a better way and especially for trying to improve the lap time and also for making a long run and try to understand our pace.

Source: Yamaha Motor Racing

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