Casey Stoner will be taking off in pole position in today’s GP race, his second of the season and his first ever at Jerez.
The Australian will be trying hard to break the duck that has never seen him take a victory at this particular Spanish circuit, in any of the GP classes he’s raced in.
Dani Pedrosa will be fighting not only against his rivals, but also his shoulder condition that could betray him from mid race on, while Jorge Lorenzo who lapped consistently fast has caught up with the dynamic Honda duo, and will try to repeat his last year’s feat and maybe experiment if his Alpinestar’s leathers actually float better than his Dainese ones, if he decides to take another swim in the pond.
The weather at Jerez however could throw a wrench into what seems a more or less predictable podium outcome.
Rain is forecast and we could see a wet race after two sunny days of practice or even a flag-to-flag and that could see a big shake-up.
Check out what the riders had to say after yesterday’s qualification session: Casey Stoner – 1st“The Qualifying result was good but as for using the rest of the session and setting the bike up, we weren’t totally happy with what we achieved and lost some time.
We’re struggling a little to get the balance of the bike where I want it, we make some improvements in the front and then some in the rear but never at the same time which is a little frustrating.
On my last run of the session I was pushing a little too hard and was a bit late with the brakes, the rear came up and I released the brakes but I had way too much speed going in there, it was nice just to avoid the air fence.
Anyway we’re happy, we’re on pole position again but we still need to finish the race tomorrow and I will fight for a podium position and hopefully the race victory, but I never underestimate the Spanish riders, they find something extra for this race and they are very hard to beat”.
Dani Pedrosa – 2nd“To be on the front row is always very important and second is a good place to start the race.
I would like to improve the bike a little bit, especially on the third section of the track, the only place where I lose some tenths, and it would help to have better braking and exit of the corners there.
It’s been tough with the shoulder – in fact this morning I decided to only do a few laps to not stress the arm so much – and it will be difficult also tomorrow, but there’s nothing else I can do, I’ll just try to finish the race in the best way possible and hopefully, bring home a good result.
We need to see how the weather is tomorrow – perhaps it rains, but maybe it could be better for my shoulder”.
Jorge Lorenzo – 3rd“I pushed the maximum from the first lap and improved my lap time from this morning.
We were one of the few to improve with the tougher conditions when the track was worse.
When we put the soft tyres in we managed to make a 1′38.
9 lap which is a good time and we were only some milliseconds from Dani and less than two tenths from Casey.
We are confident for tomorrow and we are pushing for a podium, if the opportunity arises then we will go for a victory.
”Ben Spies – 4th“That’s definitely the best session we’ve had so far.
I’ve got to take my hat off to my crew because it has been a hard weekend.
Every practice session we’ve had two different bikes while we’ve been searching for the right set up.
They’ve been doing an excellent job getting me more comfortable, I wouldn’t say I’m 100% there yet but from Friday it’s a big improvement.
In qualifying I had to do my part and step up to get closer to the front on the grid and it all worked out.
It’s definitely a team effort, I asked a lot from the guys and they came through.
I had a small crash, one of those crashes where I knew going into the corner that I’d made a mistake and was trying to slow it down but lost the front.
” Marco Simoncelli – 5th“I made a little mistake on my way into the corner at turn nine and ran wide.
I knew that lap was wasted so I came back to the pit but maybe that was the wrong decision because the tyre was still fresh so I should have stayed out there and tried to push for another lap.
Anyway, it hasn’t been a bad day at all even if this afternoon we struggled a little more than this morning, when I was able to set a steady 1m 39.
5 pace on a race tyre.
Everybody seemed to struggle this afternoon though and as far as the race is concerned I think we are in better shape than Qatar.
If we can repeat our lap times from this morning we should have fun.
”Andrea Dovizioso – 6th“I’m happy to start from the second row as we have had a difficult weekend.
We have worked a lot with the team and I could improve the feeling with the front, yesterday I struggled because of the crash and the wind in the afternoon.
Tomorrow the race will be tough as always here in Jerez because there is little grip and the bike slides a lot.
For the Championship, it will be very important to get a good result on this track as we have often struggled in the past, and racing here will be good to understand our level.
I’m happy with the improvement but we have to keep on working to reduce the gap to Casey and Dani”.
Randy de Puniet – 7th“I had just improved my best lap time.
I continued to push because I wanted to lower my best time even more.
I had a really interesting lap time after the first few corners, but I probably took turn 5 too fast and I slipped.
I really wanted to get the second row in tomorrow line up, but I am anyway satisfied.
I am optimistic and ready for tomorrow”.
Colin Edwards – 8th “I’m never happy with eighth position but I honestly couldn’t have put in any extra effort than what I did.
It is hard to be disappointed when I know I rode as hard as I could do.
It was obvious how hard I was pushing when I crashed late in the session.
But to even get close to the second row now with this level of competition, you’ve got to take a few risks.
I’d just done my fastest lap of the session when I got into the second corner and lost the front.
I wanted to push a bit more to try and get onto the second row but obviously bit off more than I could chew and down I went.
I felt good in the session because we modified the front forks by running a hard spring and it gave me the extra feedback I was looking for.
On the hard rear tyre that we’ll race on, I’m pretty happy because I was able to lap consistently in the low 40s.
We didn’t make a big step with the softer tyre so that shows we’ve got a decent race set-up and although it will be a tough race, I’m really looking forward to it.
”Cal Crutchlow – 9th“I’m really happy considering I don’t know this track at all and there are a lot of talented riders behind me on the grid again.
This morning I was seventh and I’ve qualified ninth, so I’m obviously making big progress.
That is pleasing for me and for my Monster Yamaha Tech 3 Team crew, who have been working really hard to help me to adjust quickly to riding a MotoGP bike.
My ideal time was sixth, so I can’t complain about that given my lack of experience on this track.
I actually felt more comfortable with the harder tyre than I did with the soft, so that bodes well for the race tomorrow.
We definitely made a big improvement with the front-end of the bike and I felt much more comfortable today.
But we sacrificed a bit of rear grip, so we’ve got to try and find a balance that gives me the grip I’ve got now with the front, but improves the rear feeling too.
My target for the race will be to finish in the top ten.
Looking at the lap times I’m similar to Hayden and Aoyama again like I was in Qatar.
I was a little bit behind them at the end of the race in Qatar, so hopefully I can make that step and give them a closer battle here.
My confidence is growing and I’m optimistic I can get a good result tomorrow.
”Hiroshi Aoyama – 10th“I could have done without that crash.
The afternoon started really well and we were in goodshape to get a decent grid position.
Unfortunately I had a bit of a chatter problem and maybe that was the reason for the crash.
The pain in my knee made it difficult for the rest of the session but I hope it subsides tomorrow so that we can get our feeling back and have a good race.
”Nicky Hayden – 11th“Eleventh isn’t exactly the ideal starting spot, by any means.
This morning we made a pretty good step forward to start with and improved the lap time pretty well there in mid-session, but this afternoon, with the wind, I didn’t go much faster than I went this morning under two tenths, which is certainly not good enough if you want to qualify well.
I’m not happy about the performance.
I don’t want to make a lot of excuses; the bike-rider combination wasn’t really good today, but anything can happen in the race tomorrow.
The weather seems pretty unpredictable at the moment, so we’ve just got to get prepared for anything and see what happens.
”Valentino Rossi -12th“We really didn’t need that fall because I was going quite well with the right bike, the one I like better and that I would have used to do a time with the soft tyre later.
I had to lap with the other bike, which was very different, an experiment that unfortunately didn’t work very well.
I didn’t feel good on the bike, and I was slower than I had been this morning.
It’s a shame.
If I had to make a mistake, that was really the wrong moment, because otherwise the second row was within our reach.
We could have been with Simoncelli, Spies and Dovizioso, who were on our pace.
The top three are going faster, but the difference isn’t as big as it was in Qatar.
I like the track, and our pace isn’t bad; we’ll see what happens if we’re able to get a good start.
”Hector Barbera – 13th“I wasn’t worried yesterday, because it was the first day and we still had a lot of time to work on things, and I wasn’t expecting to be up at the front after so many changes and tests with worn tyres.
Things were different today, because I didn’t finish off as I had wanted.
I think that we have the potential to have done better in qualifying.
Our problem yesterday was a lack of grip coming out of the corners, just as I hit the throttle.
We tried to rectify that today, because the bike was sliding about a lot.
Unfortunately we were unable to find an adequate solution today, so I struggled with it in both the free practice and qualifying sessions.
I wasn’t able to feel totally comfortable.
Myself and the team are working at 200%, and in the warmup we will keep on experimenting in order to get the bike as good as possible for the race.
It isn’t going to be easy, starting from thirteenth, but if I manage to feel good on the bike then I know that I can go quick.
” John Hopkins – 14th“I don’t really know where to start! It’s been a good day and we’ve taken everything step-by-step to get where we are.
It was good to sleep on the track last night – not literally – but to sleep with it in my mind! This morning we went quite a bit quicker, which we expected to do and again we haven’t made any geometry changes whatsoever to the bike.
All we’ve changed has been the electronics and the riding position a little bit, but that has just been some fine tuning.
It’s amazing the technology that MotoGP bikes have these days – it is just insane! There are so many changes that can be made for each and every rider, you can easily get lost – that’s why I’m lucky to have such a good base setting to start with.
We were able to put in some good times and consistent laps and I’m getting more comfortable with myself and my riding lines.
For qualifying I was way too excited at the start and I was making too many mistakes, rushing into the corners and running wide all over the place – I was just a little bit too happy with myself out there! I had to come in and calm it down and breathe a bit before I went back out again.
I managed to get a tow from a couple of riders because I need to get as much help as I can this weekend.
At the end quite a few people crashed all around me and I was looking for someone to follow to help me learn the lines again.
I got behind Dovizioso and Stoner on my last softer tyre and although I made quite a few mistakes on my fastest lap, I still ended up going over two seconds quicker than I did yesterday.
I am very pleased and it feels so awesome to be back out there, especially in front of the Jerez crowd.
I’m having so much fun on the motorcycle and really excited about riding, I can’t wait to get out there tomorrow and try and get the best result possible.
Obviously the goal is to try and get into the top 10 and if we can that would be great.
Most importantly though I want to go out and enjoy myself and put on a good show for the fans and the sponsors and especially for the team for all the faith that they’ve put in to me – I hope I can reward them with a good result.
”Loris Capirossi – 15th“We’ve improved since yesterday, but we have still difficulties with the front of the bike.
Rossi and Hayden are not so far, just two, three tenths of a second, so I think we can do good things in tomorrow’s race.
Randy was good, has used the session in the best way apart the last exit.
I am very confident for tomorrow.
The shoulder still give me some pain, on Wednesday I will have an important medical check up that I hope will solved my problems”.
Karel Abraham – 16thGiven our performance in free practice sessions, we could do better in qualifying session.
We still have problems with the front end, especially in fast and slow corners.
It was the same crash as yesterday.
We will try to improve our set-up of the motorcycle and we will see if it will work or not.
“Toni Elias – 17th“This morning it seemed that we have found a good direction but as soon as we have tried to go alittle bit faster I struggled again with rear grip problems and the bike was spinning a lot.
We had different directions to try but every time we tried different adjustments the bike was worse.
I cannot do what I am supposed to do especially on this racetrack which I like so much.
Anyway we have got some more things to try in tomorrow’s warm up…”