Track activity for the Ducati Team in 2014 concludes with two days of testing at Jerez

The Ducati Team successfully wrapped up its programme for 2014 with two days of testing at the Jerez de la Frontera circuit in Andalusia (Spain), where next year’s factory team duo of Andrea Dovizioso and Andrea Iannone were out on track together with a number of other MotoGP and SBK riders. Also present was test-rider Michele Pirro, who continued development work with the Desmosedici ‘lab’ bike and who will remain for one extra day tomorrow.

Today’s action was conditioned by the rain that fell overnight, and with the addition of a winter cold snap and constant showers this made it impossible to put in a good amount of laps. On Wednesday however, in much more favourable conditions, the two Andreas were on the pace straight away with their Desmosedici GP14.2 machines.

Both riders set good times after working mainly on electronics and set-up. With a time of 1’38.9, Dovizioso ended Wednesday at the top of the timesheets, ahead of his new team-mate Iannone, who was second in 1’39.0; their times remained unbeaten today.

Andrea Dovizioso (Ducati Team #04) – 1’38.9

“We had to do set-up testing to get some exact information for next year’s bike. We did a good job yesterday, lapping all day and everything went well. I set a really good lap time, our record at Jerez. Even though I don’t put a lot of importance on these times because many of our rivals were not here, it still gives you a lot of pleasure. Above all we were quick all day on used, hard and soft tyres, so this is even more confirmation that the bike has improved since mid-season and that we went better than what we did at Jerez in the race. Today I didn’t do any more laps because of the weather conditions, but there wasn’t much else to test.”

Andrea Iannone (Ducati Team #29) – 1’39.0

“Yesterday was quite a positive day because we were able to try out various set-ups for the bike, eliminate some doubts and confirm what we had already tested at Valencia. In the end I lapped quicker than what I did in the GP race. Even with the hard tyre I managed to do a good time and maintain a good pace, so I am quite happy about how this last test of the year went. We have accumulated a lot of good information for the new bike over the last two days. I’m also happy with the team, I like my new group of guys a lot and I’m pleased with the way we work in the box.”

Michele Pirro (Ducati Test Team #51) – 1’40.5

“All things considered yesterday was quite good because we tried a lot of stuff with the electronics and with the chassis components. My best lap was 1’40.5, which wasn’t that quick, but we weren’t aiming for a fast time. Today we continued working on the electronics in the wet conditions, while tomorrow we’ll do some tyre testing.”

This test wraps up the Ducati Team’s programme of activities for 2014. The Italian squad will next be back in action with Dovizioso and Iannone at the first IRTA test of the new season, scheduled for Sepang in Malaysia, from 4 to 6 February 2015.

More, from a press release issued by Aprilia:

THE APRILIA MOTOGP PROJECT IS DEVELOPING NICELY

THREE DAYS OF TESTING AT JEREZ, LOTS OF WORK FOR THE RIDERS AND THE TEAM AND EXCELLENT END RESULTS

MELANDRI AND BAUTISTA TOOK THE NEW V4 WITH PNEUMATIC VALVES ONTO THE TRACK

Jerez (Spain), 27 November 2014 – Three full days of work for the riders and the team marked the second time on the track for the Aprilia MotoGP project. After the Valencia tests two weeks ago Alvaro Bautista and Marco Melandri got back in the saddle of their Aprilia MotoGP bikes to prepare for the 2015 season.

Once again the weather unfortunately conditioned the progress of the testing schedule, especially on the last day (Thursday), with continuous showers and a constantly wet track.

Despite the stops and goes dictated by weather conditions, the Aprilia bike managed to confirm the fact that it “hatched well”, a fundamental quality for the development schedule to proceed consistently.

At Jerez the Aprilia riders were able to gain familiarity with the new V4 powerplant for the first time, an engine characterised by pneumatic valves. The engine, which guarantees higher levels of power than the first version with conventional valves, made its début on Wednesday since the work on Tuesday centred around fine tuning the electronics and set up with the old version.

131 laps were logged in Alvaro Bautista’s ‘three days’, with his best time stopping the clock at 1’40.6, whereas Melandri lapped 123 times, putting in a 1’41.5 for his best time.

There is still a long road of growth ahead, but the indications that came out during the tests on the Andalusian track left the entire Aprilia team satisfied and feeling positive as they head into the winter break. Testing will resume on 4 February with the official session in Malaysia on the Sepang track.

Romano Albesiano: “Despite the poor weather we collected a lot of information, mostly positive. This was our first chance to get in some extensive use of the new pneumatic valves engine which proved to be quite promising both in terms of maximum power and manageability, despite all the work that still needs to be done on a mapping level. Alvaro continues to increase his engagement with Aprilia in a positive way, in terms of performance as well, although there is still plenty of room for improvement. As for Marco, he is continuing his apprenticeship on the Bridgestone tyres, a rather complex issue that would have needed the full three days of testing so one that will have to be postponed to the next tests in Sepang.”

Alvaro Bautista: “We can be satisfied with the way things went, even if the foul weather slowed down our work. During the first day I continued using the bike in the same configuration as the recent tests in Valencia. We concentrated on the chassis set up, finding a few solutions that I liked and the allowed us to get to know the bike fully. On the second day I was able to use the new pneumatic valve engine. It has a lot of power but there is still a lot of work to do in terms of distributing it. Today we took a few laps in the wet which were useful in any case to assess the characteristics of the new engine in these conditions. Now we will start the winter break. I’ll take a bit of a rest to recover from this long season, after which I’ll get back to training so that I’m ready for the tests in February. In the meantime I will definitely be paying a visit to Aprilia to see the hard work the engineers are doing on the bike up close and in person.”

Marco Melandri: “These were three interesting and very demanding days at the same time. Lap after lap I am figuring out more and more where I need to improve and what I need in order to feel at ease. I still feel quite self-conscious. I think we’ll need to put in a few kilometres to find the right feeling. The new engine had a few growing pains, which is normal in this phase, but we have already seen what its positive sides are and where we will need to concentrate on improving it. We have a long period of down time ahead of use which we’ll use for development so that we’re ready for the Sepang tests. All the guys are working hard and the whole team is very enthusiastic. This is an atmosphere that gives me high hopes.”