2007 FIM MotoGP World Championship Istanbul, Turkey April 20, 2007 Free Practice Two Results: 1. Casey STONER (Ducati), Bridgestone, 1:54.200 2. Loris CAPIROSSI (Ducati), Bridgestone, 1:54.979 3. John HOPKINS (Suzuki), Bridgestone, 1:55.062 4. Valentino ROSSI (Yamaha), Michelin, 1:55.120 5. Toni ELIAS (Honda), Bridgestone, 1:55.158 7. Olivier JACQUE (Kawasaki), Bridgestone, 1:55.651 8. Chris VERMEULEN (Suzuki), Bridgestone, 1:55.707 9. Alex HOFMANN (Ducati), Bridgestone, 1:55.736 10. Dani PEDROSA (Honda), Michelin, 1:55.865 11. Marco MELANDRI (Honda), Bridgestone, 1:55.910 12. Kenny Lee ROBERTS (Honda), Michelin, 1:56.071 13. Randy DE PUNIET (Kawasaki), Bridgestone, 1:56.225 14. Alex BARROS (Ducati), Bridgestone, 1:56.233 15. Nicky HAYDEN (Honda), Michelin, 1:56.312 16. Colin EDWARDS (Yamaha), Michelin, 1:56.320 17. Carlos CHECA (Honda), Michelin, 1:56.555 18. Makoto TAMADA (Yamaha), Dunlop, 1:56.923 19. Shinya NAKANO (Honda), Michelin, 1:56.936 20. Sylvain GUINTOLI (Yamaha), Dunlop, 1:57.245 More, from a press release issued by Bridgestone: Bridgestone riders get off to solid start at Istanbul Park Round 03 Turkey Free Practice Istanbul Park, Turkey Friday 20 April 2007 With eight riders in the top ten and all five of its teams with at least one rider in the top eight, Bridgestone Motorsport has enjoyed an encouraging start to its Turkish GP weekend with the Ducatis of Casey Stoner and Loris Capirossi joining the Suzuki of John Hopkins for a Bridgestone 1-2-3 this afternoon. Honda Gresini’s Toni Elias followed up his battling fourth place in the Jerez GP with fifth place in today’s practice heading a quartet of Bridgestone riders, including Kawasaki’s Olivier Jacque, Suzuki’s Chris Vermeulen and Pramac d’Antin’s Alex Hofmann, all of whom have demonstrated competitive form in Turkey today. Overnight rain in Istanbul rendered the Istanbul Park track quite slippery at the start of the day but the lap times have tumbled throughout the afternoon with pacesetter Stoner over five seconds quicker than his best morning time. Bridgestone has traditionally struggled around the 5.340km Turkish track but new compounds evaluated directly after the last race in Jerez and brought expressly for this technically challenging GP have shown a promising level of performance. Tyre Talk with Tohru Ubukata Bridgestone Motorsport Manager, Motorcycle Race Tyre Development What conclusions can be drawn from today’s two sessions? “The track has been quite difficult today after a lot of rain fell overnight. We are still waiting for the track to come to us a bit and are yet to see the full performance level. We started the morning with some tentative laps using wet weather tyres, which do not fall into our riders’ individual allocation of 14 front and 17 rear tyres, but as the track began to dry we started to use full slicks and to start evaluating the different specification tyres we have brought this weekend. The lap times are around a second-a-lap slower than this time last year and the track has been continuing to evolve during the afternoon, so it is not easy to draw any conclusions, even if we are pleased to see so many Bridgestone riders in the top ten.” How have the new Bridgestone compounds performed today? “While it is difficult to analyse tyre performance over many laps because of the changing track, we have seen some initially encouraging results from the new compounds that we have here in Turkey. The demands of the circuit put a lot of stress on the tyres, in terms of grip and durability, so these are the areas we must focus on. The weather should remain dry, so the circuit should be in better shape tomorrow, when we will carry out longer runs to gauge the durability of our tyres.” Bridgestone Combined Free Practice Session Results Pos Rider Team Session 1 (pos) Session 2 (pos) Gap P1 Casey Stoner Ducati 1m59.426s (13) 1m54.200s (1) Fastest P2 Loris Capirossi Ducati 1m58.857s (8) 1m54.979s (2) +0.779s P3 John Hopkins Suzuki 1m58.554s (3) 1m55.062s (3) +0.862s P5 Toni Elias Honda Gresini 2m00.362s (15) 1m55.158s (5) +0.958s P6 Olivier Jacque Kawasaki 1m58.821s (7) 1m55.651s (6) +1.451s P7 Chris Vermeulen Suzuki 1m57.794s (2) 1m55.707s (7) +1.507s P8 Alex Hofmann Pramac d’Antin 1m58.800s (5) 1m55.736s (8) +1.536s P10 Marco Melandri Honda Gresini 1m58.802s (6) 1m55.910s (10) +1.710s P12 Randy de Puniet Kawasaki 2m00.941s (18) 1m56.225s (12) +2.025s P13 Alex Barros Pramac d’Antin 1m59.371s (12) 1m56.233s (13) +2.033s Weather: Wet track, gradually drying – Air 14°C, Track 18°C, Humidity 24% (Session 1) Dry track – Air 18°C, Track 35°C, Humidity 15% (Session 2) More, from a press release issued by Rizla Suzuki: Rizla Suzuki MotoGP on the pace at Istanbul Park Rizla Suzuki MotoGP racer John Hopkins clocked the third fastest time during today’s free practice sessions for Sunday’s Grand Prix of Turkey. Hopkins (1’55.062, 34 laps) consistently improved his times throughout the day and has identified some alterations that he and his crew will be working on overnight to make the latest 800cc GSV-R perform even better tomorrow. Chris Vermeulen (1’55.707, 37 laps) recorded the seventh fastest time of the day at a circuit that holds good memories for him following last year’s pole position and top 10 finish. The 24-year-old Australian set his fastest time on the 23rd lap on the same Bridgestone race tyre. Today’s quickest time was set by Casey Stoner on his Bridgestone-shod Ducati, as Bridgestone riders filled eight of the top 10 places. Vermeulen and Hopkins were the second and third respectively during this morning’s session when conditions were very difficult for all riders. Overnight rain left the track very wet and as it began to dry situations didn’t improve as the 5.3km circuit was very dusty and slippery. Rizla Suzuki MotoGP has one more practice session tomorrow morning followed by an hour-long qualifying period in the afternoon. Sunday’s race is round three of the MotoGP World Championship and the lights will change to go for the 22-lap race at 15.00hrs local time (12.00hrs GMT). John Hopkins: “I’m pretty pleased with how this afternoon’s gone. I didn’t get a lot of practice this morning as the track was too wet and really dirty. We got some good laps towards the end of the last session and we have found some things we can work on tonight that should smooth a couple of areas out. The weather for tomorrow looks like it’s going to be good and we are really looking forward to the weekend. Bridgestone has brought us some new tyres to try here and they seem to be pretty good for both performance and durability. We’ll now have to go out tomorrow, get our heads down, and qualify well!” Chris Vermeulen: “I was looking forward to coming back here after last year’s performance when I got my first pole and top 10 finish. We got here this morning and it was a bit wet so we lost a lot of the session to that. When it dried out it was very slippery and dirty so we really couldn’t get a lot done, but this afternoon we had a bit more of an idea which way to go. This is the first time here on the 800 so everything was really starting from scratch; I felt comfortable this afternoon and only used one set of tyres. I set my quickest lap on the 23rd lap, which is further than race distance, and the tyres were still working well. Maybe tomorrow we can go out with a softer, grippier tyre and go a bit quicker!” Paul Denning Team Manager: “There had been a lot of discussion regarding tyres before we came to Istanbul, given that no teams had run one of the new 800s here. It seems like Bridgestone has got its sums right based on initial performance and the onward progression seems to be continuing in very much the right direction. “John has had a strong day and has identified some key areas that can be significantly improved on for tomorrow. Chris set his best lap on a 23-lap old tyre and he too has a number of things to work on during Saturday. “The new 800cc GSV-R appears to be a really nice package around the Istanbul circuit and we will be hoping to achieve the maximum out of it over the course of the weekend.” More, from a press release issued by Kawasaki Racing Team: JACQUE SIXTH FASTEST ON OPENING DAY IN ISTANBUL The three-week break seems to have had a reviving effect on Olivier Jacque, who led the charge for the Kawasaki Racing Team today to finish this afternoon’s free practice session sixth fastest overall at the impressive anti-clockwise circuit of Istanbul Park. After two days of fickle weather, the forecast have been respected today and a sunny but cold day has characterised the opening day of the Turkish Grand Prix, although overnight rain left the 5.34 km track damp and slippery. Jacque was one of the first ones to go out on the track in this morning’s hour-long session and the improvements tested at Jerez’s test proved to be on the right direction allowing him to carry out a steady performance since the very first moment. With the track almost ten degrees warmer in the afternoon, Kawasaki’s 33-year-old kept working on the gearbox and the balance of his Ninja ZX-RR as well as their choice of tyres. After last year’s performance, it was a mystery how competitive Bridgestone tyres’ were going to be and eight of their riders at the top ten was a splendid result for the Japanese manufacturer. Worse was the debut of Jacque’s teammate. Randy de Puniet was one of the numerous riders to suffer the consequences of this morning’s unpredictable track. The 26-year-old Frenchman was high-sided off his Ninja ZX-RR due to an excess of confidence that led him to rush when opening the throttle on only his second lap at the Turkish circuit. With his right heel a bit sore, de Puniet had to catch up on his programme in the afternoon. With the same tyre for almost all the session, the young Frenchman worked on the chassis balance and suspension set up in order to improve rear grip and handling of his Ninja ZX-RR. With both riders satisfied with the base set up of their machines, tomorrow will be the time for thorough work with the tyres and balance adjustments in order to gain consistency on the lap times to face Sunday’s 22-lap Grand Prix with more confidence. Olivier Jacque 6th 41 Laps Best Lap 1’55.651 “We started where we left in Jerez. The bike is more efficient now and both sessions have been quite significant. I felt comfortable riding the bike and my lap times improved in every run I did. The set up we found in Jerez is working well here. The engine is the same one but with the new mapping it seems to be more powerful. We also improved the balance of the bike and the gearbox, as this circuit is a little bit tricky, and worked as well with three different rear tyres and two front ones. We don’t know yet which ones are best and that is what we will try to confirm tomorrow. In short, it has been a positive first day and it is important to start like this.” Randy de Puniet 12th – 30 Laps – Best Lap 1’56.225 “I had a bad crash in my second lap this morning and I hurt my right heel. It was so painful and I thought I would probably have broken it but it wasn’t broken. I have been lucky! There are no excuses; I made a mistake. I tried to make up the time in the afternoon and we went through slight changes in the set up and also a couple of tyres with positive results. I did 22 laps with the same tyre, and set my best lap on the last one. We will go through it again tomorrow, but anyway, it is quite promising. Stoner was so fast today but all others are quite close. I struggle a bit entering the corners so, apart from the tyres, the plan for tomorrow is to work on the balance of the bike.” Naoya Kaneko Technical Manager “Unfortunately, Randy crashed in the morning and that delayed a little bit our programme. The most positive is that he wasn’t injured. Olivier went step by step and progressed a lot throughout the session. Hopefully he will keep doing it tomorrow. About the set up, there are still some points to improve, mainly regarding the feeling, and tomorrow we will keep working on geometry and suspension in order to fix it. Tyre-wise our choices are limited, like everybody else’s, but we are optimistic. The main issue now is the balance as this circuit has a lot of hard-braking points and accelerations. We need more stability if we want to improve the consistency of our lap times.” More, from a press release issued by Gresini Racing Honda: ELIAS ON TARGET FOR FRONT ROW AS MELANDRI MAKES OPTIMISTIC START After a three-week break the MotoGP engines fired up once again today at the Istanbul Park circuit that will on Sunday host the third round of the season. It was an unlucky start for Honda Gresini rider Marco Melandri, who has dominated here for the past two seasons, with victory on the Herman Tilke designed circuit in both 2005 and 2006. Melandri was immediately on the pace today although he was the victim of two unfortunate crashes, setting back his work programme for the weekend. The Italian was uninjured and he remains optimistic and confident of improving in tomorrow’s practice sessions after finding a good feeling with the bike at this circuit. His team-mate Toni Elias, the current lap record holder thanks to his best effort (1’52″877) in last year’s race, made a positive start and was the fastest Honda rider on the day with the fifth quickest time overall. TONI ELIAS (5th,1’55″158): “I’m really satisfied with this first day. In the morning we were a little worried about the tyres but in the second half of the afternoon session our choice proved to be the right one. I found a good feeling with the tyres, I’m comfortable on the bike and we also made a small step forward with the set-up. We have to keep working in this way if we are to break into the lead group. The track conditions should be a lot better tomorrow because today it was quite dirty”. MARCO MELANDRI (10th, 1’55″910): “Today was more difficult than we expected. We haven’t tested here but I was fast straight away so maybe I was a little too aggressive. I had two stupid crashes, one under braking, the other opening the gas, and in both cases the front folded. That obviously affected our work today but I’m confident we have a big margin to improve. Today I wanted to check our rear tyre choice but I didn’t have the right feeling. Tomorrow I’ll try a different tyre, following the advice of the Bridgestone technicians and I’m very optimistic. To see three Bridgestone bikes at the front is an added stimulus.” FAUSTO GRESINI: “Marco’s two crashes didn’t help things today and it’s a shame because he was looking strong from the start. Marco still has to work on finding the right feeling on the front but he looks calm and confident to me. Toni has set a good lap time and he is going well but there is still work to do.” More, from a press release issued by Ducati Corse: GREAT DAY FOR THE DUCATI MARLBORO TEAM IN TURKEY Ducati Marlboro Team men Casey Stoner and Loris Capirossi made a brilliant start to the Turkish Grand Prix today, ending the first day of practice fastest and second fastest. Their pace proves the strengths of the Desmosedici GP7 and shows that Bridgestone has made huge strides forward since last year’s race at Istanbul Park. This morning’s opening session was run in cool, damp conditions, but the weather improved substantially for this afternoon’s outing, when track temperature reached 35 degrees. CASEY STONER, fastest, 1m 54.200s “That was really good, the last run was my first time on new tyres since I first went out this morning. We tried a different rear, so we’ve only used two rears from our selection and we’ve got another couple to try tomorrow. It would be nice if we can find an even better one. Everything seems pretty comfortable, pretty good at the moment. We haven’t changed the settings too much from Jerez, so obviously the team did the right things for this circuit. For sure we need to improve the bike before we get to the race but track conditions are going to change a lot, so we don’t know how our current settings will work by the time the race comes around. As always, we’re trying to make the bike as perfect as possible, we need it to turn a bit better, with a little more traction and a little less pumping. Once we’ve got those things we should have quite a good package. I’ve had some pretty good results in the past here so it would be nice if we can continue that. It’s not my favourite track, it’s very technical and it’s difficult for set-up but we seem to be doing the right job at the moment. Also, it’s good to see Loris back on form, you can see it in his eyes. It’s nice that both of us are running up front.” LORIS CAPIROSSI, 2nd fastest, 1m 54.979s “I’m very satisfied. We’ve worked really well on bike set-up so I’m enjoying riding again and that’s good. We made some adjustments for more front-end feeling and I felt better with every lap, so we will continue working in this direction and I think I can improve even more. The first two races were quite demanding for me but now I’m back up front and that’s important. Bridgestone are doing a great job with the tyres. The front we are using here is a hard tyre and a bit difficult on the first lap, but after that it works really well. The rear is also hard but it’s quite consistent over a lot of laps and that’s encouraging. This morning the track conditions were really difficult but bit by bit they improved. It’s a bit like Qatar, the times will drop further tomorrow and many riders will be faster. I feel in great shape, I look forward tomorrow and Sunday’s race.” More, from a press release issued by Dorna Communications: Enjoying the benefits of a track dried out by the sunshine after a downpour last night, the MotoGP riders began their preparations for Sunday’s Grand Prix of Turkey in earnest this afternoon. The morning sessions took place on a somewhat slippery surface, with a number of riders falling victim to the treacherous wet patches. In the afternoon conditions had further improved, for a somewhat faster MotoGP free practice session. One of the favourites for victory at Istanbul Park, Casey Stoner was in good form this afternoon to lead the way on his 800cc Desmosedici GP7. The Australian went round in a time of 1’54.200, nearly eight tenths of a second quicker than Ducati team-mate Loris Capirossi as the duo made it a one-two on the opening day of practice sessions. At a track where all of the podium finishers were on Michelin tyres in 2006, Bridgestone made the early headway this afternoon. John Hopkins was third quickest on the Suzuki GSV-R800, just off Capirossi’s time. Current World Championship leader Valentino Rossi was on hand to remind the Ducati pairing that he is always a threat, coming in fourth fastest in his first extended 800cc practice on Turkish soil. The Italian rode very few laps this morning owing to the track conditions, but began his serious preparations today at the track where he has not won in two visits. Toni Elias and Olivier Jacque completed the top six, making it five different teams and five different factories in the top group. Chris Vermeulen, Alex Hofmann, Dani Pedrosa and twice winner in Turkey Marco Melandri were the final four riders in the top ten, with the latter twice crashing over the course of the day without serious consequences. Shinya Nakano also had a pair of incidents to shake him up, seeing smoke pour from his Honda in the morning and red flagging the afternoon outing after a lowside left his bike on track. 250cc The same top three that provided so much entertainment at Jerez in the 250cc category were back in the saddle as they battled for provisional pole. Alvaro Bautista continued to show why he has been strongly favoured to succeed in the quarter litre category this season, leading the way with a time of 1’58.405 to put him ahead of Andrea Dovizioso and the dominant Jorge Lorenzo en route to provisional pole. The latter has taken pole for, and won, the first two races of his title defence, and rounded off the top three separated from Bautista by less than a tenth of a second. Alex de Angelis, Julian Simon and Mika Kallio also made up a varied field in the fastest six, ahead of Hector Barbera, 2006 race winner Hiroshi Aoyama, Yuki Takahashi and Shuhei Aoyama. 125cc In 125cc, Mattia Pasini once again came out of the starting blocks eager to make his mark. The Italian, who took pole at Jerez three weeks ago but was forced to start from the back of the grid after a warm up breakdown, took the provisional top spot at Istanbul Park after clocking a time of 2’05.739. Whilst Pasini has yet to score points this season after a series of setbacks in the opening two races, Gabor Talamacsi has stormed ahead to lead the series on 45 points. The Hungarian was on form again at Istanbul, putting in a time just over two tenths of a second slower than that of Pasini. Tomoyshi Koyama was third fastest, ahead of Simone Corsi, Lukas Pesek, Sergio Gadea, Sandro Cortese and Andrea Iannone, whilst the fastest rider of the morning Bradley Smith completed the top ten behind Hector Faubel. More, from a press release issued by Konica Minolta Honda: Bad luck hampers KONICA MINOLTA Honda in first practice KONICA MINOLTA Honda are confident of bouncing-back from a series of incidents which has seen rider Shinya Nakano sit uncharacteristically down the order during first practice for Sunday’s Turkish Grand Prix. With the first session at the Istanbul circuit damp it was only in the final 30-minutes of the session that riders ventured out onto the track. With temperatures low, a number of riders were caught out by the conditions. Unfortunately, a technical problem with Nakano’s Honda RCV212V meant that he had to use his number two machine, which wasn’t set-up with the fork settings and tyres the Team wanted to test for Sunday’s race. In the afternoon session bad-luck struck again, when Shinya crashed early on in the session once more before any useful information on the chosen set-up was gained. If the Team have two incident-free sessions tomorrow, they’re confident of a turn-around in time for Sunday’s race. Gianluca Montiron Team Manager KONICA MINOLTA Honda “We have suffered some very bad luck today! This morning the damp conditions meant that many riders didn’t go out until the final part of the session and this meant we didn’t have much of an opportunity to analyse and prepare for the race on Sunday. Tomorrow it is very important to make the best use of the both sessions for us to decide and understand our tyre strategy for race day. Today we saw how the new tyre rule can affect the results. Tomorrow the temperatures are expected to change again during the day, so the qualifying session in the afternoon will be very interesting as people will push hard to get the best result they can, while still deciding their own tyre strategy for the race. Right now engine technician is analysing all the data to understand what happened to our engine this morning.” Shinya Nakano Rider, KONICA MINOLTA Honda (40 laps 1′ 56.936″) “Track conditions were poor this morning so most riders only went out on track during the last 30 minutes or so and this and our technical problem with the engine of our number one bike didn’t allow me to get much in the way of useful data for the afternoon session. In the afternoon I was pushing hard to try and find the limit and it was then that I crashed at the final corner. Maybe the conditions were still not perfect from the morning. We now have much to do tomorrow as we have to work out what tyres we want to use for the race which may be difficult as temperatures are expected to change again tomorrow and again on Sunday so these factors may well determine the results of Sunday’s race.” Giulio Bernardelle Technical Director, KONICA MINOLTA Honda “It’s been a tough day. This morning the track was still wet and then when the conditions were improving we had a technical problem with the engine and we had to stop using our number one machine. Our second bike had different settings and tyres from what we wanted to try, so we didn’t really gain any useful information. In the afternoon Shinya crashed on the machine with the fork settings and tyres we wanted to test early in the session, so again we had to revert back to a bike, which didn’t have the settings on it that we wanted to evaluate. The fact that we haven’t yet had a chance to try the tyre or settings we want to gives us hope for tomorrow, but we now have a lot to do in the two sessions.” More, from a press release issued by Fiat Yamaha: ROSSI FOURTH AFTER FIRST DAY OF PRACTICE IN TRICKY TURKISH CONDITIONS Valentino Rossi finished the first day of practice for the Grand Prix of Turkey in fourth position today, the top Michelin rider in the 19-strong MotoGP field at Istanbul Park. After heading the standings in this morning’s practice, Colin Edwards struggled with front-end problems this afternoon and the American could only manage 15th in the combined standings. Although the sun shone all day, an overnight rainstorm and cool temperatures this morning meant the track was still wet for first practice and, although it had dried out somewhat by the afternoon, it remained quite dirty and the poor conditions meant that lap times were considerably slower than the existing lap record. Without any testing at this track this season, the team face a hard task to find the correct set-up and tyre combination before Sunday’s 22 lap race and the tricky track conditions today complicated their task. After losing much of this morning’s session to the wet track both crews worked hard throughout this afternoon’s practice, which was interrupted by a red flag for a short time after Shinya Nakano fell. Team-mates Casey Stoner and Loris Capirossi topped the time sheets, whilst third spot ahead of Rossi went to John Hopkins. Valentino Rossi Position: 4th Time: 1’55.120 Laps: 33 “The conditions today weren’t ideal for us as the track was very, very dirty. However we’re not in such a bad position in fourth and when you compare it to last year, when we had some serious problems here, things are much better and I can ride the bike very well, in fact I like the track a lot more with this bike! Stoner especially was very fast today and I think that tomorrow is going to be a hard battle for qualifying. We need to work on the tyres and the set-up but I am confident that we can improve things quite a bit more tomorrow. The Japanese engineers have been working very hard during the break and today we tried out some new modifications for our engine. My first impressions are that it’s a definite improvement and we can go a little bit faster. It’s not a big difference but it’s very important, especially here at this track. Now let’s see what we can do tomorrow.” Colin Edwards Position: 15th Time: 1’56.320 Laps: 28 “Strangely I felt more comfortable with the front end this morning, when the track was wet and even dirtier than it was this afternoon! Unfortunately we’ve got some problems to deal with in the front-end and we didn’t quite get to the bottom of them today. This afternoon I stayed on the same front as we used this morning and we’ve been playing with the setting but at the moment it’s not working great and I can’t ride it how I want to. We need to look at both the setting and the tyre situation and make some adjustments in order to be in a position to challenge tomorrow. Apart from that the bike feels okay and I’m confident that once the team work their magic tonight, as they always do, things will be working good.” David Brivio Team Director “The conditions today weren’t good because of the rain overnight and so we lost a lot of this morning’s practice. Unfortunately the track remained quite dirty and so the lap times are quite a lot slower than the last couple of years. Anyway, we have to work in these conditions so the team have tried to make the best of it and we’re trying to analyse the problems we’ve encountered today. This afternoon Colin was suffering more than Valentino and he has some set-up problems which we need to work through. Of course the tyres are also very important here because it’s the first track that we’ve been to this year without testing and our choice is also limited by the new regulations. However Valentino was able to improve his set-up a bit this afternoon and hopefully we can do the same with them both tomorrow.”