FIM MotoGP World Championship Red Bull U.S. Grand Prix Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca Monterey, California July 27, 2012 Free Practice One Results (all on Bridgestone tires): 1. Dani PEDROSA, Spain (HONDA), 1:21.424 2. Jorge LORENZO, Spain (YAMAHA), 1:21.498 3. Casey STONER, Australia (HONDA), 1:21.829 4. Ben SPIES, USA (YAMAHA), 1:21.939 5. Andrea DOVIZIOSO, Italy (YAMAHA), 1:22.609 6. Cal CRUTCHLOW, UK (YAMAHA), 1:22.672 7. Valentino ROSSI, Italy (DUCATI), 1:23.216 8. Stefan BRADL, Germany (HONDA), 1:23.249 9. Nicky HAYDEN, USA (DUCATI), 1:23.310 10. Alvaro BAUTISTA, Spain (HONDA), 1:23.537 11. Colin EDWARDS, USA (SUTER), 1:24.905 12. Aleix ESPARGARO, Spain (Aprilia-ART), 1:25.169 13. Karel ABRAHAM, Czech Republic (DUCATI), 1:25.215 14. Mattia PASINI, Italy (Aprilia-Speed Master/ART), 1:25.488 15. Toni ELIAS, Spain (DUCATI), 1:25.816 16. Yonny HERNANDEZ, Colombia (Kawasaki-BQR/FTR), 1:25.904 17. James ELLISON, UK (Aprilia-PBM/ART), 1:25.931 18. Danilo PETRUCCI, Italy (Aprilia-IODA), 1:26.125 19. Michele PIRRO, Italy (Honda-FTR), 1:26.421 20. Randy DE PUNIET, France (Aprilia-ART), 1:26.703 21. Ivan SILVA, Spain (Kawasaki-BQR/FTR), 1:27.102 22. Steve RAPP, USA (Kawasaki-APR), 1:29.814 More, from a press release issued by Repsol Honda: Pedrosa fastest in Laguna Seca with Stoner in third position It was a good start for the Repsol Honda Team in Laguna Seca. Both riders had their first outing on the challenging American track also taking the opportunity to try some new parts in this morning’s session. Dani found pace very quickly and after two runs with his ‘standard’ bike, he swapped to the new one he first tried in the Mugello test, with new engine and new chassis, to set the fastest time (1’21.424), less than 1 tenth off the circuit record (1’21.376, Casey Stoner 2010). Casey also did his last run with the new engine mounted on his ‘standard’ chassis, which he feels more familiar with, and also improved his lap time to finish third with a fastest lap of 1’21.829, 4 tenths off his team mate. The action continues in Laguna Seca with the second free practice scheduled at 14h10 local time (23h10 C.E.T). DANI PEDROSA 1st 1’21.424 “We had a pretty good start of the weekend. The times has been fast from the beginning and we got into the pace quickly. I did my first two runs with my current bike and the last one with the new one and the feelings are quite similar to Mugello, which is positive. I’ll test both bikes again this afternoon to have more data to judge with higher temperatures and hard tyres and we’ll see how it goes. This is a demanding track physically, it’s small but technical and the bike moves a lot. I think that with the new engine the bike is more stable, smother due to the engine brake. I did my best lap with the new bike, even though we didn’t work on the set up yet, so let’s see if we can improve it a little more and decide on the best option for t he race on Sunday”. CASEY STONER 3rd 1’21.829 “Track conditions seem quite good for the first session as it usually takes some time to lay some rubber down before the track feels good. The rear tyre seemed to drop away quite quickly, after the first few exits we didn’t have much grip so we need to work on that. We had a few issues on stability, we need to get the bike turning a little better, try and reduce some of the front chatter and get more stability out of the bike in general because we’re getting a lot of movement on the entry and exit of the corners. So a few things to work on but in general we’re ok, it’s only FP1”.