Top time for Nicky Hayden at Jerez on weather-affected day two
The second of three days at the Jerez MotoGP test was significantly
affected by changing weather conditions, with a light but steady rain
falling on the Andalusian circuit all morning. Both riders took to the
track at approximately 2:30 p.m. for a few exits with rain settings.
Only toward the end of the day did the asphalt dry enough to allow the
use of slick tyres, with which Nicky Hayden, on his third-from-last lap,
came very close to his best showing from yesterday, posting the fastest
time of the day.
Valentino Rossi was among the riders who didn't take a final run with
dry tyres, and as a result, he didn't improve upon the time that he'd
set in the rain in the early afternoon.
Nicky Hayden (Ducati Team) 1st, 1:40.755 (40 laps) - dry tyres
"It's a shame about the weather because I'd like to take advantage of as
much time as possible to work on the bike, since I lost so much time in
the past few months. That's how it was today though, and it does no
good to complain, especially since I had the chance to try the GP12 in
the rain for the first time, improving my feeling little by little. We
took a long break when the track started to dry out, and we put on the
slicks at the end, even though there were still some wet patches out
there. I was able to do a couple exits to try the two little changes
that we'd planned yesterday. Considering that the conditions weren't
perfect, it's positive that we quickly come close to my best time from
yesterday. Now we hope the weather will let us work well tomorrow,
because we'd like to improve some details before Qatar, especially with
traction in the fast corners."
Valentino Rossi (Ducati Team) 19th, 1:51.910 (18 laps) - wet tyres
"I'm sorry to have lost practically the entire day of testing, even if
we still did three exits with wet tyres and a wet setup, to confirm the
feelings we had in similar conditions at the last test. Otherwise,
there's not much to say. We couldn't work well today, but the forecast
for tomorrow is better, so we hope to be able to continue working on the
setup that we identified at the end of the day yesterday."
