Spanish Grand Prix, Jerez - Practice
DAY ONE 2006: DUCATI MARLBORO MEN UP FRONT
Ducati Marlboro Team riders Loris Capirossi and Sete Gibernau
enjoyed a positive first day of the 2006 MotoGP World Championship
at Jerez today, completing the first two practice sessions
for Sunday's keenly awaited, season-opening Spanish GP a close
second and equal third fastest.
Conditions weren't perfect, with this morning's session held
in cold and damp conditions and this afternoon's in cool and
windy conditions with dark clouds threatening. Capirossi was
quickest in the damp and led much of the second session, ending
up just 0.012s behind reigning World Champion Valentino Rossi.
Gibernau was also impressively fast this afternoon, a mere
0.185s off 'pole position' and looking forward to further
progress tomorrow, for which the weather forecast predicts
sunny and warm conditions.
LORIS CAPIROSSI, second fastest, 1m 41.625s
"This afternoon was the first real practice session,
although the track was still damp in places, so I couldn't
use my usual lines everywhere. The damp bothered me more than
I expected. Furthermore, no rubber has been laid down, which
means the track conditions are very different from the tests
we did here two weeks ago. But overall I'm very, very happy
with today. I'm only 12 hundredths behind the fastest guy
which is nothing, and we were fast in the wet, so we are ready
whatever the weather. The bike set-up is almost identical
to what I used at the tests, the tyres are the same too, though
we'll test some new Bridgestones tomorrow. We know we can
be faster than today, which is good. I'm okay, I'll keep working
and hope for some nice weather."
SETE GIBERNAU, equal third fastest, 1m 41.798s
"Today was okay, no one could do any real work this morning,
so this afternoon was like our first practice session. Even
then conditions weren't perfect, it seemed like there were
still a few damp patches out there, so we're not going quite
as fast as we were at the tests. For me, we need to make the
bike easier, more natural. I'm still fighting with it more
than I'd like, but the team has got some ideas to work on
that. I'm not really thinking too much about lap times at
the moment. I know we can be fast but we need to be constantly
fast, so we're working more towards a good race pace. Bridgestone
have some new tyres here, so we've still got more stuff to
try tomorrow."
Temperatures: Ambient: 23 degrees. Track: 33 degrees
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