FIM MotoGP World Championship Phillip Island, Australia October 14 Free Practice Two Results (all on Bridgestone tires): 1. Casey STONER, Australia (HONDA), 1:30.535 2. Marco SIMONCELLI, Italy (HONDA), 1:30.912 3. Jorge LORENZO, Spain (YAMAHA), 1:31.111 4. Ben SPIES, USA (YAMAHA), 1:31.495 5. Dani PEDROSA, Spain (HONDA), 1:31.543 6. Hiroshi AOYAMA, Japan (HONDA), 1:31.582 7. Randy DE PUNIET, France (DUCATI), 1:31.670 8. Alvaro BAUTISTA, Spain (SUZUKI), 1:31.777 9. Colin EDWARDS, USA (YAMAHA), 1:31.805 10. Andrea DOVIZIOSO, Italy (HONDA), 1:31.825 11. Nicky HAYDEN, USA (DUCATI), 1:31.899 12. Cal CRUTCHLOW, Great Britain (YAMAHA), 1:31.969 13. Valentino ROSSI, Italy (DUCATI), 1:32.014 14. Loris CAPIROSSI, Italy (DUCATI), 1:32.082 15. Karel ABRAHAM, Czech Republic (DUCATI), 1:32.360 16. Toni ELIAS, Spain (HONDA), 1:32.639 17. Damian CUDLIN, Australia (DUCATI), 1:33.658 More, from a press release issued by Rizla Suzuki: Strong start for Bautista at a sunny Phillip Island Rizla Suzukis lvaro Bautista finished the second free practice session for the Australian Grand Prix in eighth place this afternoon. Bautista (P11 overall, 131.777, 42 laps) made a consistent progression up the leader board throughout the afternoon session before breaking into the top-10 in the latter stages. He finished only 0.256 seconds from fourth place and Bautistas fastest time was almost two seconds quicker than his qualifying lap at Phillip Island 12 months ago. He is positive of further improvements tomorrow and convinced the GSV-R will be able to challenge for a good finish on Sunday. Todays practice was held in warm and sunny conditions, with clear blue skies covering the 4,448m Phillip Island circuit. Australian Casey Stoner recorded todays fastest time on his home circuit, as he looks to secure the World Championship in his own backyard. Rizla Suzuki has one more free practice session on Saturday morning before the hour of qualifying in the afternoon will decide the grid positions for Sundays 27-lap race. lvaro Bautista: Up until this year this has not been one of the best tracks for the GSV-R and it was quite difficult here for me last year. In the first session this morning I didnt feel a lot of rear grip, but we changed some things for this afternoon and it made a big difference to the feeling. We also worked on the electronics and altered the mapping for some of the corners to help with rear grip. At the end of the second session with some new tyres there was a big difference than with the used ones. This track has very fast corners and you can feel a difference between new and used tyres here quite a lot. I have done my best-ever lap at Phillip Island today and a 131 is not a bad time, but I still feel that we can improve the feeling in the bike and be quite a bit quicker. On the new tyres I can ride normal and with a good rhythm for a few laps, but it soon becomes difficult to exit from the corners and get the grip I need. We have improved a lot from last year and I feel more relaxed on the bike. I am happy with the first day, but will be a lot happier if I can get a good feeling tomorrow like I have had in the last few races, then Im sure well be in a good position for the race. Paul Denning Team Manager: The pace of the Rizla Suzuki GSV-R on Phillip Island today is confirmation of how well, and how far, Suzuki has developed the bike since 2010. The character of the track is still not the best for us and lvaro still has a couple of fundamental issues that are holding him back, but to be 0.2-of-a-second from fourth place and in the top-10 in this afternoons session is like a dream compared to last year. We still expect a tough weekend and a tough race, but we fully believe we can be in the fight for a decent position on Sunday. More, from a press release issued by Bridgestone: Stoner sets pace on opening day in Australia Round 16: Australian GP Free Practice One & Two Phillip Island, Friday 14 October 2011 Bridgestone slick compounds available: Front: Soft, Medium. Rear (asymmetric): Medium, Hard Casey Stoner got his home Grand Prix off to a great start today, heading the timesheets in both free practice sessions aboard his Repsol Honda machine. As the conditions changed between the two sessions, Stoner’s best lap actually came in the morning’s session, as it did for half of the riders in the top ten, and was just 0.4seconds off the lap record. The weather conditions at Phillip Island this year are much better than they were last season with blue skies, only moderate wind and a track temperature of 38 degrees Celsius in the morning, rising to 42 for the afternoon session as opposed a Friday high of just 12 degrees Celsius in 2010. Stoner set his best lap using the softer front and harder option rear slicks. With only one point of heavy braking in a lap, the front tyres have a relatively easy time at Phillip Island, as do the right shoulders of the rears, but it’s a different story for the left side of the rear tyres. Thanks largely to the last two corners, the left shoulders reach the highest tyre temperature of the season, requiring a special construction designed to cope with the heat, and hence it was the harder option rear that was favoured by most riders for its added durability. Despite a good forecast for the rest of the weekend, the weather can be fickle on Phillip Island. MotoGP running resumes tomorrow with the final free practice session in the morning followed by an hour of qualifying at 1455 local time. Hirohide Hamashima Assistant to Director, Motorsport Tyre Development Division “The laptimes were generally faster this year than on the opening day last season but this is mainly due to the temperature and weather conditions which are much more favourable. We’re used to much colder and windier conditions here, and last year the track was 30 degrees Celsius cooler than we saw today. The circuit also seems more bumpy though which is having an adverse effect. Most riders, including Casey, went faster in the morning when the track temperature was a little lower and the softer rear was favoured. In terms of tyre choice, the softer rear was favoured in the morning but as the temperature rose most used the harder rear in the afternoon. Front tyre was more mixed as Casey was fastest on the softer option, whereas Jorge recorded his best on the harder. We have gone one step softer with the rear tyres this year, but even with the increase in temperature I am satisfied with our compound allocation this weekend and we can see that all options have been used well on this opening day.” More, from a press release issued by Monster Yamaha Tech 3: Fantastic fourth for Edwards in Phillip Island practice Colin Edwards made a flying start to practice for the Australian MotoGP round at the spectacular Phillip Island circuit today, the American powering his Monster Yamaha Tech 3 Team machine to a fantastic fourth place on the timesheets. Edwards was immediately on the pace in this morning’s opening practice, the experienced 37-year-old quickly finding a comfortable set-up with his YZR-M1 machine to post a best lap of 1.31.480 that placed him in an outstanding fourth place. Only Casey Stoner, Jorge Lorenzo and Marco Simoncelli were faster and Edwards started this afternoon’s second session in optimistic mood that he could once again challenge for the top five in gloriously sunny conditions at the 2.764 miles circuit. But changes to the settings on his Monster Yamaha Tech 3 Team machine for the second session didn’t deliver the expected improvements in performance and he lapped at a best pace of 1.31.805 to finish in ninth. His impressive pace this morning though secured him the fourth best time on the combined leaderboard and he will work closely with his Monster Yamaha Tech 3 crew tonight to gain more turning performance from his YZR-M1 machine ahead of tomorrow’s final practice and qualifying sessions. British team-mate Cal Crutchlow made a solid start to the weekend and he finished 12th on combined times with a best lap of 1.31.969. Crutchlow has previous experience of the breath-taking Phillip Island track from his time in World Supersport and World Superbikes, but today was all about acclimatising to the circuit’s fast and sweeping corners on the Monster Yamaha Tech 3 800cc MotoGP machine. The 25-year-old set a time of 1.32.583 this morning and he needed only four laps of the second session to better that pace. He eventually lapped well over half-a-second faster and he completed the day just over 0.4s behind Edwards. Colin Edwards 4th 1.31.480 36 laps: “This morning went brilliantly and I came out of the gate really fast and flying. I felt good on the bike but this afternoon I just couldn’t get close to the pace I had this morning. I had really good grip from the front tyre this morning but when the temperature started to come up a little bit the track started to feel a bit greasy. So for this afternoon we switched to the hard compound front tyre to see what the difference was and there is a really fine line between what does and doesn’t work around this track. We made one little change to the bike but the bike became really hard to ride. The track is pretty bumpy and I was having a lot of vibration and I just didn’t feel anywhere near as comfortable in the second session as I did this morning. We need to go back to what we know worked this morning and make a couple of tweaks to see if we can make that set-up better. The main thing is to get the front working better over the bumps.” Cal Crutchlow 12th 1.31.969 43 laps: “Today’s result doesn’t look too bad on the timesheets because although I am down in 12th, I am less than half-a-second away from Colin and he is fourth. But it was a very difficult day to be honest because I had a lot of grip issues and the bike was hard to turn as well. And if I run over any rough tarmac or any bumps I nearly crash, so I’ve got to sit down with my guys tonight and come up with a plan to try and make the bike better fo r tomorrow. We made an improvement to the bike after this morning and that was reflected in the times because I was quite a bit quicker this afternoon, but we’ve still got a long way to go to make feel more comfortable and confident. I think we need to be looking at making some pretty drastic changes to the bike for tomorrow, but I’m confident we’ll find something and I’ll be battling for a place in the top 10 on the grid.” More, from a press release issued by Yamaha: The Grand Prix of Australia got underway today at the Phillip Island circuit with two free practice sessions run under glorious sunshine and warm conditions. Yamaha Factory Racing rider Jorge Lorenzo was very quick to find a good pace in the morning session, the only rider able to get close to Championship leader Casey Stoner. Lorenzo wrapped up the morning in second, just 0.269 seconds from first. The afternoon saw times suffer a little as track conditions changed, the Mallorcan’s pace dropping slightly as he hunted extra rear grip, finishing in third, 0.576 seconds from provisional pole. Ben Spies made big improvements between the two sessions today. The Texan struggled in the morning session, unable to find a good pace with no positive set up. Some hard work by his crew delivered a much more competitive set up for the afternoon enabling him to climb from eighth in session one to fourth in session two, finding over half a second of extra speed. Jorge Lorenzo Position : 2nd Time: 1’30.744 Laps: 24 “Today I felt great in the morning but in the afternoon not as good. It was impossible to replicate the lap time from the morning. We were up to five tenths slower and I’m not sure why, maybe the track conditions were different, anyway we’ll see what happens tomorrow. We know that Casey is very fast here but today he wasn’t so quick. We must try to win and if not possible fight for the podium on Sunday.” Ben Spies Position : 5th Time: 1’31.495 Laps: 36 “I’m feeling good today; we started this morning with both bikes not working so well so we knew we had to come up with something this afternoon. The second session we were working really well but still struggling in a few areas we need to make better tomorrow. I think we definitely can and if we do I can see us dropping up to half a second pretty easily. It’s up to the boys; we know what the problem is we just need to work out how to fix it. As always I’m going to try the best I can to make it interesting for the fans and get up there.” Wilco Zeelenberg Team Manager “It was quite a good day for us today, the morning session especially was a little bit better than the afternoon. Everybody seemed to have less speed on the straight which was strange as there wasn’t much wind. Jorge feels confident on the bike and has space to improve, especially with rear grip. The gap between him and Casey was quite close this morning so we are quite satisfied with the first day.” Massimo Meregalli Team Director “We had some problems from the morning session with Ben which we partly solved in the afternoon allowing him to get more and more comfortable on the bike. There are still some points where we have to improve and work on but it seems that we know what we need to do. Hopefully the track will be dry tomorrow morning so we can see if we get the results we expect from the changes. Overall the pace is good and our tyre choice is almost done so for a first day we’ve done a great job. Jorge was very quick to find a good pace this morning. He still needs to find something but we are confident he will also make another step tomorrow.” More, from a press release issued by Pramac Racing: GOOD START FOR DE PUNIET AT PHILLIPS ISLAND WITH THE TENTH POSITION. CAPIROSSI BACK AFTER INJURY FIFTEENTH Good way to start the weekend for Randy De Puniet who concluded the first day of practice with the tenth fastest lap time of the day with just a bit over a second from the first, Casey Stoner. The Frenchman has worked well improving lap by lap his performances and tomorrow will look for more improvement to conquer a good position for Sunday’s starting grid. His teammate, Loris Capirossi, returned on track after missing the Japanese race due to his right shoulder injury and has finished the day in fifteenth position. The good news from the Italian is that the shoulder doesn’t bother him so much and should be ok for the rest of the weekend. Marco Rigamonti Randy De Puniet Track Engineer “Today has been a good of practice for us. The most important thing for us is the feeling that our rider give us and Randy is quite positive. He has done a really good job achieving good lap times while all alone in the track. This means that he has the possibility to fight for important positions in both, tomorrow qualification and Sunday’s race. We will give him maximum support to be as fast as possible.” Randy De Puniet Pramac Racing Team 10th in 1’31.670 “Not a bad way to begin the weekend. In the last few races we were quite competitive since the beginning but than we couldn’t manage to achieve good result during the race. I hope this time it will be different and that Sunday we can conquer something important for me and for my Team. It will be important for us because in the next race, in Malaysia, it will surely be much more difficult to be as competitive as here.” Loris Capirossi Pramac Racing Team”- 15th in 1’32.052 “I was curios to see how my physical condition were and I have to say that I am quite satisfied. The shoulder does still give me pain and I am at 85 % at this moment. Not so bad but each lap I will ride the more painful it will be. Anyway I should be able to finish the weekend without too many complications. Bike wise this morning things seem good and in the afternoon we couldn’t improve as we expected also because the temperature was a bit cooler. Tomorrow things may change with the weather and this would surely mix the cards around.” More, from a press release issued by Repsol Honda: Stoner leads the pack in Phillip Island On the first day of Free Practice in the Australian Grand Prix, local boy Casey Stoner ended the top of the timing sheets with Respol Honda team mates Andrea Dovizioso and Dani Pedrosa sixth and seventh. Weather conditions at Phillip Island were perfect with an afternoon air temperature of 21 degrees and a track temperature of 44 degrees, however all three riders reported a very bumpy track compared to last year. Casey had a fall in FP1 but soon put it behind him and concentrated on finding the best set up for his RC212V to attack the bumpy Phillip Island track. In FP2 he found some more rear grip but lost some front end feeling, he remained fastest of the day with a 1’30.475 lap. Andrea also complained about the track surface and spent the sessions working on the feeling in the front of the bike, alternating between the hard and soft compound tyres to see which worked best. Dani struggled with rear grip and only improved his lap time slightly from the morning session, he and his team will work hard in FP3 tomorrow morning to find the best set up for Qualifying. CASEY STONER 1st 1’30.475 “I don’t feel totally comfortable with the bike today and I’m sure we can improve the bike a lot. The track is certainly a lot more bumpy than last year and I think it will be very difficult to get the bike feeling 100% as the circuit is making things worse. In general we’ve found the Honda is better in certain aspects than what we had last year but with these bumps it’s difficult to compare in other areas. We need to get the bike riding the bumps in the front a lot better, and also find some more rear grip. There is still a lot of work before we find the right race set up and we know we can go a lot faster”. ANDREA DOVIZIOSO 6th 1’31.532 “It’s been a difficult first day of practice. The track has many more bumps than last year and it’s difficult to see them, maybe because the surface is very dark I don’t know, but I’ve been struggling to get a good feeling with the front. I decided to keep the hard tyre in front because it suits my riding style more, but with these bumps it’s impossible to control the bike and when I switched to the soft front tyre I couldn’t improve my time either. If the temperature drops tomorrow it will be even more complicated, but we will try our best to improve and have a good qualifying session”. DANI PEDROSA 7th 1’31.543 “In the morning I began calm just to get the feeling with the track and we did a decent time, but in the afternoon I struggled a lot with the rear grip, the bike was spinning a lot and we couldn’t fix it during the session. The fact that my lap times are practically the same in the morning and in the afternoon is a sign that something is not right. It’s a pity because maybe tomorrow the weather is not as nice as today, possibly colder, but I trust my team and I hope we can improve. The track is also very bumpy, much more than last year, which makes things even more difficult, there are many places where the wheels are off the ground. Anyway, we will try to make some changes on the bike and I will do my best to improve my riding and let’s see what we can do tomorrow”. More, from a press release issued by LCR Honda: SPRINGTIME WELCOMES THE MOTOGP RIDERS AT P.ISLAND GP OPENING DAY Phillip Island, 14th October: sun shines in today’s Australian Grand Prix opening day at Phillip Island race track which hosts the penultimate over sea round of the championship and unthinkable ambience temperature of 21 degrees welcomed the MotoGP teams and riders this morning. Local hero Casey Stoner, who has his first chance to clinch the 2011 MotoGP World Championship, topped the time sheet on 1’30.535 while LCR Honda racer Toni Elias is making his 12th visit to the island, where he had success as a younger rider. He raced his RS125 Honda to third place in the 2001 125cc Grand Prix, a race in which he finished two places in front of his current team owner, Lucio Cecchinello. The Spaniard riding the RC212V made the most from his machine lapping the ocean track 44 times and posting his best lap time on 1’32.639. Elias 16th 1’32.639: “Well….first this sunny weather was a real surprise for everybody and today’s conditions were unexpected. So the track temperature was much higher than what we thought. Here on this track the key is the rear traction on left side out of the corners because it’s extremely important to find the right race tyre that does not spin so much. We have been working on that today to improve the rear grip and bike stability. We made an improvement in the second session and now we are working hard to take another step forward to close the gap to the front”. More, from a press release issued by Marlboro Ducati: UPHILL START FOR THE DUCATI TEAM AT PHILLIP ISLAND The Ducati Team started its setup work for the Phillip Island circuit today, ending with Nicky Hayden and Valentino Rossi ninth and thirteenth, respectively. After a good start in the morning session, the American wasn’t able to improve in the afternoon, while the Italian lowered his time by just one tenth. Tomorrow, both riders will try to find a solution to improve grip with the Desmosedici, and Rossi, who is also having trouble with persistent pain in his left hand, will work with his team to improve braking and corner entry, searching for the good feeling he had at Motegi. Nicky Hayden (Ducati Team) 9th (1:31.662) “As far as weather is concerned, this is probably the nicest day I can remember at Phillip Island in a long time, but we always hope for better results here than what we had today. The track’s definitely got a bit bumpier, which is obviously the same for everybody, so it’s not an excuse. The bike is harsh over the bumps, so in places I have to use a slower line in order to miss them. We tried to do some laps on hard tyres this afternoon, but we need to find more grip, both in order to be faster and to get better tyre life. We’ve got a lot of work to do, but we’ll do our best tomorrow.” Valentino Rossi (Ducati Team) 13th (1:32.014) “Today wasn’t easy, especially since we had hoped to be better immediately, like at Motegi two weeks ago, as this track is normally good for the Ducati. We started with the same setup, with just a small adjustment to the fork spring, but the feeling wasn’t the same. I wasn’t able to ride well today, in part due to the pain in my left pinky finger, which bothered me more than I expected, but especially because of the feeling with the bike. I’m not able to brake well or enter corners well. Tomorrow we’ll try stronger painkillers for my hand, and from a technical point of view, we’ll look for a different solution to improve the front and to do better than thirteenth place. We won’t change the setup completely. We’ll probably move the position of the front wheel, but we’re just talking about small changes.”