DUCATI MARLBORO TEAM CONCLUDES TESTING IN AUSTRALIA
 Carlos
Checa and Loris Capirossi again concentrated on tyre testing
and race set-up at Phillip Island. The Ducati Marlboro Team
back testing in Qatar from Tuesday March 1 onwards.
Phillip Island, 19 February 2005 - The Ducati Marlboro Team
successfully concluded its Australian testing programme today
at the Phillip Island circuit. In cloudy but mild conditions
(22° air/29° track), Ducati engineers and riders continued
development work on the Desmosedici GP5 with the new Bridgestone
tyres.
A few drops of rain fell at around midday, forcing the team
to take a break, but the day's testing schedule was unaffected.
Development work with the latest Bridgestone tyres is continuing
and Carlos Checa and Loris Capirossi were able to use the
Australian track for numerous tests with rear tyres, some
new and others used previously, but all the while keeping
the same set-up to concentrate exclusively on the different
tyre reactions.
Spanish rider Carlos Checa was in particularly good form
today, ending the test with a best time of 1m29.86s over 88
laps. Satisfied with the three-day testing session in Australia,
Carlos tried to put in the maximum number of laps on the most
promising rear tyres.
"I am really happy with this testing session, with my
team and with my bike" declared Carlos. "We found
a good base set-up for the Desmosedici and some very interesting
indications on which to work in the future. Now it's time
for a short break and then we'll be back to work in Qatar".
Today Loris Capirossi focussed on suspension set-up but also
on mapping work for the powerful Desmosedici engine and at
the end of the day was pleased with the bike's better 'driveability'.
Loris ended the Phillip Island session with a quickest time
of 1m30.18s after completing 59 laps..
"I'm generally pretty pleased with my pace, which was
quite good for several successive laps at around 1m30s"
said Capirossi. "We still have to do a bit more work
over the longer distance, but I and my team are ready!".
Satisfaction about the Australian tests was also expressed
by Ducati Marlboro Team technical director Corrado Cecchinelli,
who commented: "Even though we lost a bit of time today
due to a few drops of rain, we are very pleased with the way
the test went: we did many consecutive laps in race set-up
and gained a lot of information on how to evolve both the
suspension set-up of the bike and the rear tyres. Even though
we know that the weather conditions for the race will be a
bit different, we gathered a lot of information which will
be useful next October."
The next tests for the Ducati Marlboro Team will
be as follows:
March 1-3 at Doha (Qatar)
March 18-20 at the IRTA Tests, Catalunya (Spain)
March 25-27 at the IRTA Tests, Jerez de la Frontera (Spain)
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