Despite all the controversy from the riders that surrounded this weekend’s Japanese GP at Motegi, when the light went out at the end of the pitline for today’s free practice sessions, all the MotoGP riders were present and accounted for.
To keep the fear level and paranoia down, the paddock is getting regularly sweeped with Geiger counters by a couple of engineers hired by Ducati and some of the paddock personnel have even brought their own.
Several teams and riders have brought their own private supply of water and food stuffs (even if they were told not to).
The track has been re-surfaced following the devasting earthquake and tsunami that hit Japan last March, and it offers a better grip than last season and both Ben Spies and Hector Barbera are sick, and this time it isn’t racing oriented as you’ll find out.
Dani Pedrosa – 1st“We did a good job today; in the morning we took a good direction and this allowed us to improve a lot in the afternoon, by a second, and this is very important.
Tomorrow we have to focus on the set up of the bike; maybe the weather will change a little bit, so we have to be aware of the conditions and try to be fast anytime.
In case it does rain tomorrow and we cannot practice anymore in dry conditions, we already have a good set up for the dry.
Everybody here at the Motegi circuit has done a very good job with the new surface, the grip is much better than before and this is one of the reasons why the lap times have improved quite a lot already from last year.
” Casey Stoner – 2nd“The bike felt pretty good this morning and then this afternoon we started the session on pretty much the same setting that we ended on this morning, it felt ok but we felt we could improve.
Unfortunately we went in slightly the wrong direction and couldn’t get the bike to turn or hook up on the last two exits and then we didn’t really have enough time to come in and make a change.
We know what direction we want to go in now and hopefully tomorrow we can make the small improvements.
The new surface here feels very good, very smooth and the grip level is impressive.
It’s really great to be racing here on a Honda in front of the home fans and I hope we can get a good qualifying tomorrow to prepare best for the race on Sunday.
”Andrea Dovizioso – 3rd“I am very happy with today’s sessions.
All the Honda riders are constantly fast and we are all very close.
The new tarmac is ok, but totally different feeling from last season, it’s still bumpy, even more then before, but anyway we are faster then in 2010.
The feeling with the tyres is totally different due to the new tarmac and the biggest problem is to find rear grip entering corners, this is the area where we will concentrate our efforts for tomorrow.
” Marco Simoncelli – 4th“It went really well considering we improved much in the morning round.
In the afternoon we tried some things to improve braking because I had some difficulties.
We’re looking for the correct fork setting and today we tried an option that didn’t go well, so tomorrow we will try thr opposite of tofay’s setting.
We also had some problems with tire wear, so we are looking for a solution to have a consistent performance throughout the race.
At the moment I’m still missing three tenths for a pace closer to that of Pedrosa and Stoner, so we’ll work with the aim of reducing that difference.
”Jorge Lorenzo – 5th“We improved the lap time quite a lot from the morning to the afternoon session but it’s still not enough, the competition is very strong here.
It is going to be a very difficult weekend to fight for the podium and the victory.
We are trying some things on the bike to improve the stability on braking and into corners.
We found a little but still need to find some more! We are fifth which could be worse today.
”Nicky Hayden – 6th“I had fun riding the bike today, and that’s important.
This morning was really encouraging, because I could ride comfortably, and we really haven’t made many changes throughout the day.
I’ve steadily got a little bit faster, but the others made a bigger jump in the afternoon.
I’ve certainly had worse Fridays this year, but we’ve got a long way to go if we want to be near the front on Sunday afternoon.
We’ve got a couple of small ideas to try to improve the bike under braking.
As hard as Ducati has worked to try to help us, it would be really nice to give them a result they deserve.
”Hiroshi Aoyama – 7th “The start has gone really well, but for the moment there is still not a lot of grip in the rear.
Tomorrow we will try to find solutions to improve this problem with a set-up better suited to give us more confidence.
This is our goal and if we can get it, I’m convinced I can qualify in a good position for Sunday’s race.
In any case, I’m happy because I think we started on the right foot.
It is very important for me to get a good result on home track.
”Valentino Rossi – 8th“We made progress with the bike throughout the day, and as a result we improved our lap times, dropping below 1min 48.
The pace is still far from the top, but not bad for now.
There are a number of things to resolve, but we’re definitely not in the situation we were at Aragon, where we always had big problems with rear grip.
That’s not the case here.
We worked on weight distribution, loading the front a little more, and it’s better.
Tomorrow we must try to drop into the low 1min 47 range.
That’s our goal.
Nicky is already there, although he chose to ride mainly with the soft tyre.
The track is good.
The asphalt has good grip, and they did a good job.
”Héctor Barberà – 9th“I have had two rough nights, vomiting and the rest, so I am feeling pretty weak but you don’t even think about that when you’re on the bike.
The Honda riders are doing a great job but we have our own objectives and after fighting for seventh place in the last race we can do so again here.
We are doing a good job so far, we’re only three tenths off seventh today and a little more than a second off the fastest time.
Everything is in the right place and I know I can continue to improve tomorrow.
The goal is to be the fastest Ducati and the two that are in front of us are very close.
We made a set-up change at the end of the session today, playing around with the suspension height, and I think it was positive.
The new track surface is good, with decent grip, and I am sure it will be even better with more rubber down tomorrow.
The best thing is there are less bumps and that allows you to ride with more confidence.
”Colin Edwards – 10th“It was a decent start to the weekend without being anything too special.
I was reasonably happy this morning to be seventh fastest and really close to the top six.
But this afternoon we ran the hard tyre for the whole session and I didn’t really feel that good.
I just can’t get the lap time out of it even though I can’t really pinpoint any specific issues with it.
I can’t sit down with my crew and tell them where we’ve got problems, but it made the bike a little bit more nervous.
I expected to be higher than 10th after this morning but this is a point and shoot track and there is no getting away from the fact that we are struggling on acceleration.
At a track like this where there is a lot of low gear acceleration points it shows up more.
Tomorrow we need to test the softer tyre for a little bit longer to make sure we can do race distance on it, but we’ll also be working harder to improve the set-up of the bike on the hard tyre to give us the best chance possible of a strong result for Yamaha on Sunday.
”Álvaro Bautista – 11thWe tested a different setting this morning and compared it against the one from Aragon.
We used the new set-up in the bike with the new swinging-arm and it was definitely better.
This afternoon we tried the harder option tyres, because although the softer ones were not too bad this morning, I still had a bit of movement entering the corners.
This track has a lot of hard braking and the harder front tyre is much better for that because it gives me more stability.
We still don’t know which compound we will use for the race, so we have to test a bit more tomorrow and it will also depend on the temperature on race-day.
At the end I got into a fairly good rhythm, but I still don’t feel 100% with the bike.
I had a little gear-shift problem and this made judging the braking points quite difficult, and I had a lot of movement because I was moving my whole body to change down a gear.
We improved at the end, but not enough and I think that we can make some big steps tomorrow.
With some hard work we can make the bike perform better and improve our lap-time.
” Randy De Puniet- 12th “It was not an easy first day, I am not happy with the sitting of the bike, specially to stop the bike with the braking stability very low.
We tried to improve in the afternoon but it wasn’t quite enough.
The rear grip with the soft tyre isn’t so good and we need to work very hard for tomorrow.
Also with front and rear suspension we need to make some important modifications.
It doesn’t look easy right now, but we will not give up and we will try to lower our lap times by at least half a second to be competitive in the race.
”Cal Crutchlow – 13th“I’m happy enough with my pace today because this is a really weird and difficult track with a lot of really hard braking points that makes it very physical.
I’ve had a few arm pump issues this year but thankfully the surgery I had a few weeks ago has done the trick because today I had no problems at all.
And if there was going to be an issue with my arms it was going to be at this track because of all the hard braking.
Unfortunately we’re lackin g a bit of engine performance but there is nothing I can do about that.
It is a bit of a disadvantage but I managed to find a second this afternoon, so that shows with more experience of the track I am able to make big progress.
Track experience is vital because I beat Aoyama in Aragon a couple of weeks ago but today he is seventh fastest.
I’m only three tenths from being inside the top 10, so if I can find that time tomorrow and get on the third row of the grid, I’ll be well happy with that.
”Ben Spies – 14th“What a shocking start to the weekend, I don’t think I’ve ever been as sick as I was on the journey over here, I was nearly not allowed on the plane.
I’m slowly getting my strength back thanks to the great guys at Clinica but didn’t have enough to ride properly in the second session.
I started to get tunnel vision on the straight and just felt it was too dangerous to be out there.
I’m working with Clinica today and tomorrow and am sure things will be a bit better for qualifying and the race.
I’m really sorry for my team and all the Japanese fans who came to watch today.
”Toni Elias – 15th“We arrived here in Japan with the same target of the last races: we intend to close the gap to the front and this is a track where I always had good performances in the past.
We know there’s work to do after this first outing but today we made a couple of changes in the front geometry and at the end I got into a fairly good rhythm.
I liked those adjustments and I feel more confident ahead tomorrow’s practices”.
Kousuke Akiyoshi – 17th“Well… I know this track like the back of my hand and I am very happy to race in Motegi ahead my fans.
I would like to thank Honda and LCR staff for this great opportunity.
I feel in a good form and today I made my first run out on this bike working through a number of various set-up changes especially in the engine management.
With some hard work we can make the bike perform better and improve our lap-time.
” Shinichi Ito – 18th“Today I returned to the MotoGP Paddock after four years away, it’s a very special atmosphere that I like very much.
I would like to thank everyone at Honda and I’m very happy to work again with my team manager Taddy, all the mechanics who I have known for a long time and especially HRC President, Suzuki san and HRC Executive Vice-President, Nakamoto san.
I really appreciate that they came into the box to give me their comment, it meant a lot to me.
After two sessions I’m more confident with 800 machine and I get a better feeling lap by lap but at this moment my lap time on the MotoGP machine is slower than my best lap time with a Superbike.
Today I made almost two second progress from FP1 to FP2, but tomorrow I will try to make another step.
”Damian Cudlin – 19th“I think basically the first day went ok, we couldn’t expect to be faster.
It’s the first time I step on this bike and the first time I ride in Motegi.
There are many things to learn in a short amount of time.
We improve at every lap, but I know that the closer we get to the other riders the harder it will be to improve.
I just want to concentrate to improve; I am enjoying it a lot at the moment.
We don’t need to make many changes to the bike right now, I can guarantee that if we leave it like this we will lower our lap times tomorrow morning anyway.
Let’s hope to have a good Saturday to try to be with some of the other riders during the race.
”