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2008-06-26 Rider claims after day 1 in Assen
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 Casey Stoner today shown performance that usually means that he will have one of those races where his opponents watch him disappear in the distance, without any chance to follow his pace. With one day still remaining for everyone to improve set-up, there are still some chances that Rossi, Pedrosa or someone else finds extra speed, but so far this was not the case. Read rider thoughts after day 1 in Assen.
Casey Stoner - 1st - 1:36.078
We're very happy with the fact we've come to another circuit and the new set up is working as well as it did at Catalunya and Donington. There don't seem to be any bad points to it and it is helping me ride like I want to again. I'm able to use harder compound tyres again and I'm just getting a better feel for the whole bike in general, without it bucking and weaving everywhere. We had a couple of moments today where it thought about trying to spit me but nothing to worry about. If you watch the race last year you can see the bike moving around a lot and we were struggling, whereas if you saw me ride today you can see what a huge step forward we've taken. In fact, maybe with the exception of Donington, this is probably the first time since Qatar where I can say that this bike is better than last year's. Today we've gone faster than the pole record on a race tyre so we're delighted with how everything is coming together.
Valentino Rossi - 2nd - 1:36.819:
Second place this afternoon is not bad at all, considering that this morning we had some problems. This afternoon we made some modifications and we started to improve quite a bit. We are still struggling in some points of the track however and this shows in the gap that we still have to Stoner. During this afternoon’s session we understood some interesting things, which we hope will help us tomorrow. Today, however, it seems like I am the leader of the ‘other’ championship!
Colin Edwards - 3rd - 1:36.931:
I’m pretty pleased with that because if you take Casey out of the equation I’ve got the pace to match anybody. We made a small change to the bike after this morning because here you carry so much load you have to play with the spring rate to get the right feeling. How my bike was set-up from Donington, it was just a bit too lazy and slow to react around this track. There are some pretty fast changes of direction round here. I was getting it to change direction but it was all happening a little bit too slow. My team had some good ideas to try and help the bike steer a bit better but it didn’t feel great. There was a bit too much weight on the front. I was pushing but I didn’t want to push any harder because the feel just wasn’t there. We made another little change and I was straight into the low 37s and I was on it. We then changed the front setting again and I got a lot more confidence in the front and it felt awesome. I was never outside the top three so it is looking good. The grip feels really good and all my tyres seem pretty good so thanks to Michelin for that. You need endurance round this track and nothing too crazy grip wise in the beginning that might drop off. We’ve got a good direction but honestly if it is going to rain on Saturday I’d really like to get some rain tomorrow. I need to sort out this year’s bike for the rain. We have a year old rain setting that works good but that setting needs to be tweaked for this year’s bike. I could start the race with my old faithful rain setting and it will work, but we can make it better after what we had at Donington in the wet.
Nicky Hayden - 4th - 1:37.012:
It’s nice to finally see a little bit of summer weather starting to hit Europe. The track is in great condition, they did a great job of having it clean, so we were able to get up to speed a lot faster than last year. All in all it’s been a pretty solid day. We made a little bit of an improvement this afternoon. I wasn’t able to improve my best time by much but I was able to be a lot more consistent out there. I was hoping to go a little quicker at the end which didn’t happen. The bike’s working pretty well here but we’re certainly going to have to step it up a bit to get in there and be really competitive. We’ve got a few ideas to try and make it a little bit better tomorrow, the rider too.
John Hopkins - 8th - 1:37.251:
It's been a good start for us today. We have had some new specification engine parts to test and these have definitely shown an improvement. We're running pretty much the same set-up as last time out and the Kawasaki seems to be getting around here really well. This afternoon we ran through every tyre we had allocated to us to make a decision for the race, because we are unsure of what the weather might do during tomorrow. The last tyre we tried worked really well and we'd like more dry time to do a long run to test it for durability. The competition is close and apart from Casey (Stoner), who is a long way ahead, we're running the same times as everyone else so I'm pretty happy with that. The injury is starting to feel better now and I'm really feeling confident ahead of qualifying tomorrow.
Dani Pedrosa - 9th - 1:37.280:
During the afternoon session we tried a different settings solution for the chassis in an effort to improve my feeling thorough all the changes of directions here, but it didn’t give the results we had expected, so I couldn’t be fast as I wanted this afternoon. We also tested some tyres, looking for the best solution for Saturday. But the big question mark is once again the weather; we can’t be sure about what the weather will do tomorrow but it looks like it may be wet so we tried to get as much work as possible done during the course of today’s two sessions. Tomorrow, weather permitting, we will keep on working on the set-up to improve our race pace.
Chris Vermeulen - 10th - 1:37.282:
It’s been not too bad on the whole today. We had a bit of a problem this morning with some engine settings on the bike and it made it quite difficult to ride. The technicians worked hard to correct it and they even got some information from the factory in Japan to help us and together we were able to overcome the problem. The bike worked a lot better this afternoon, but because I missed a lot of this morning’s session with trying to get the set-up right it left us with a lot of work to do this afternoon. We managed to get inside the top-10 and I am sure there is even more to come tomorrow.
Andrea Dovizioso – 11th - 1:37:326:
The gap of three tenths to fourth is not important as many of us are all together within a second and I know that we can improve. We are working to improve the overall stability of the bike, which in braking and in the corners doesn’t give me the confidence I’m looking for at the moment. We tried today a lot of tyres and made many runs but it’s not so obvious at the moment which we will use for the race, which in my opinion will be run in the 1m 37 bracket which I feel I can reach. This pace could make for an interesting race. With the MotoGP bike Assen remains one of the tracks, which are not my favourite, but today is the first day and I think that tomorrow things will be easier for us. This is another reason why I’m not worried by our position of 11th overall today.
Sylvain Guintoli – 12th - 1:37.357:
Surely this has been my best first day of the season on dry surface. I feel really comfortable on my bike thanks to the modifications we have done on the front part of the bike. We are really close to the fastest riders. Tomorrow we should concentrate to improve the race rhythm. I registered my best lap time with the hardest tyres used today. Probably we will use them also in the race and this gives me good confidence. I hope to have a good qualifying tomorrow to be able to start in the best way possible in the race.
James Toseland - 13th - 1:37.838:
It is hard work at the moment to be honest. We wasted a lot of time and should have gone with the setting we had at the end much earlier. Basically I’ve gone closer to what Colin is running but we didn’t do it until too late and it was quite a frustrating session. I got up to speed quite fast right at the end when we tried this new setting so it seems like we have found a good direction but we wasted too much time getting there. The bike is better on the brakes because I was losing so much rear grip on the entry of the corners that I had no corner speed with the other setting. The way this new setting transfers the weight is much smoother and doesn’t move weight off the rear as quick. With the new setting I got straight into the 37s and I feel I could have built on that but we’d been going round in circles for too long. I just spent too much time in the garage and when I need the track time to get the bike set-up on a track I’ve not tested on, I can’t afford to do that. I’m trying to learn the track on this bike so I need to be out there. Now we’ve got this setting I’m confident for tomorrow that we can move forward.
Jorge Lorenzo - 14th - 1:37.960:
It was a bad session today and I was not expecting to be so slow here, at a track that I love. We need to do more laps in order to improve and try to find a way to change things; I am suffering a lot on the bike because I don’t have enough confidence in the front. I am losing time in all areas, we know the bike can be faster but I can’t find the way to ride it like this. I need to have more trust in the bike, but at the moment I think the problem is me and I am just not riding as I should be.
Loris Capirossi - 15th - 1:38.082:
After this morning’s practice I was quite happy, because my hand was working well and there was no pain. I felt that I was riding quite well and settling back into things. In the afternoon I came in and put on a new tyre and the first lap out it felt quite good, but when I changed down from sixth to fourth gear and leaned on the left side I lost control and the bike jumped me out of the seat. The problem was that when I crashed the bike came on top of me and I get this hole in my arm. It was not easy when that happened, but I know I have great support all around me from many people. I will now work to get myself 100% right and jump back on the bike as soon as possible!
Anthony West - 16th - 1:38.413:
I'm a bit frustrated to be honest. I came here thinking that our set-up from Donington Park would be a good starting point for this circuit, but that's not been the case today. We've had some problems with chatter that we haven't had before, and we're struggling a little bit with drive out of the turns. But, my crew already have some ideas on how we can improve things tonight, which we'll check out during practice tomorrow morning. It looks like we've got a bit of a fight on our hands this weekend, but that's all part of the job. I really like the Assen circuit, so I hope we can get things sorted ready for qualifying tomorrow.
Toni Elias – 17th - 1:38.656:
I am happy this day has passed. Today I started with a lot of caution for the reason that everyone knows. In the first five laps I have ridden really slowly in the turn where I have fallen last year to gain back the confidence with the track. But from the second session I started again to give my best. We have meet some problems that have blocked us, but we believe we can improve tomorrow to increase our performances and be competitive in the race.
Marco Melandri - 18th - 1:39.020:
At the moment it is not looking good. This afternoon we tried to load the front up a little more to improve the steering and feeling in the fast corners but we lost a bit of grip on the rear and in the end the bike was harder to ride. We took a step backwards with the setting at the end and I did two runs where I rediscovered the feeling I had this morning. However, at the moment we're still a long way off finding the solution to our problems.
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