MD600 development has been in “race phase” since the last All Japan Championship in Okayama. We are again taking this great opportunity to test the machine in All Japan Championship, Twin Ring Motegi round. There was 3days test at Motegi in previous week, however, the typhoon brought us wet condition and we couldn’t have sufficient test in dry condition. We were only able to start testing with slicks from Friday’s A.R.T. official test. We brought newly developed #10 proto which design was based on the data we gained from last race with #7 machine at Okayama, and #9 proto. Because we didn’t have enough test data of the new swingarm we designed for #10, we adopted the swingarm from #9 to #10 and used it as a main machine. Our target at Motegi was 1min51.412sec, MotoGP GP250 circuit record. We had 2 sets of 30min on track, from 8:30 in the morning and 12:15 in the afternoon. Since we didn’t have any data of dry condition test, we had to start looking for basic balance of front & rear. We were trying some new design ideas in #10 proto so we couldn’t just use data from other proto machines. 1hr on Friday wasn’t enough for us to find the basic machine balance. The Saturday qualifying session was 35min only. If we could have another session, we may be able to try something first and change, but that wasn’t the case. We set up the machine based on the Friday’s data and went for 35min. It wasn’t satisfactory result but it was enough to put us on the top of the time sheet; 1min53.753sec. We used the 15min of Sunday warm up session to further improve the machine setup before the race. There were some red flag incidents in other classes and our race delayed for 30min, scheduled to start from 15:40, temperature was already going down. Team manager, Mamoru Moriwaki decided to change the setup to adapt this temperature change. This was one of test subjects we wanted to work on during this race week. The race started. Shogo Moriwaki was the first one to go into the first corner. He was passed by one GP250 rider at V-curve in the lap but recovered his position soon and started leaving all 250s behind. Although, 1min55s sec pace was faster than GP250s, it was far slower than our objective. He marked 1min54.786sec, the fastest lap time of the race at the last lap and finished. Mamoru Moriwaki, Team manager’s comment We set the suspension to “hard” for the race. Eventually, it wasn’t right for today’s condition and it made race very slow. However, we are developing the machine for our future customers and we needed to experience such event. So, it was not all bad. Anyway, the time we had was far too short. But we could do some test items we wanted to and got some data. I think we, now, can fix the direction of basic dimension of the chassis so we are going to start weight reduction. This can be done at our design group, separated from current testing activities. For some company like us, It is great fun to develop something from scratch. Our development members are really putting their effort and their working speed is getting faster and faster. I have been passing my long-time experience to young members in the last 3yrs and this MD600 project has been a great subject. Our plan to enter the All Japan Championship finishes now, at least for a while, and we are sending a MD600 to Spain. There is a team like to race MD600 at Spanish Championship. I want to have many riders as possible to try on our MD600 to get feedback for our development and this is a right opportunity. Our development is still ongoing and I want to further improve the machine potential to be able to show performance that everyone wants to see. So I would like to ask your continuous support, and like to thank all the fans cheered our team at Motegi. Shogo Moriwaki’s comment I noticed that the setup wasn’t right during the sighting lap so I was careful at the beginning of the race. I deliberately slow down right after the race started so I knew I would be passed by someone. With that giving condition, I was lapping 1min55s sec and trying to cover the negative side of the machine setup by my riding. I was finding some good and some bad, going too far or going too close. and managed to put all good parts together at final lap and got 1min 54s sec. Our level was still low but we gained a lot of running data. I could see which line 250 riders take compare to MD600. It was important and fruitful development opportunity. 1hour on Friday, 35min on Saturday, and 20min race on Sunday. total of 2hours in the 3days wasn’t enough at all. I myself as a development rider, I really wanted to ride more. So maybe we couldn’t go far as we wanted in our development but there were many hints to improve my ability as a development rider and to further develop the machine. I definitely feedback all the things I learned and bring the best out of it. Thank you very much for your support.