STONER FASTEST IN RAIN AT MUGELLO, CAPIROSSI HAPPY WITH
NEW ENGINE SPEC
Ducati Marlboro Team riders Casey Stoner and Loris Capirossi
finished today's first two practice sessions at Mugello fourth
and ninth fastest overall. World Championship leader Stoner
shone in this afternoon's rain-lashed second session, lapping
fastest aboard his Bridgestone-equipped Desmosedici GP7.
Conditions this morning were cool and dry but thunder, lightning
and torrential rain hit Mugello at lunchtime, flooding parts
of the track, riders experiencing aquaplaning where the circuit
was at its wettest. Stoner rode a few exploratory laps when
heavy rain was still falling, then returned to the pits to
wait until near the end of the hour when the rain had eased
off. Capirossi meanwhile spent the day comparing and refining
his new engine spec, which has been designed to offer smoother
power delivery.
CASEY STONER, 4th fastest, 1m 51.356s (rain: 2m 07.107s)
"The wet is no real drama for me, at Le Mans we didn't
really have the perfect setting, we definitely gained experience
from that, so we changed the wet setting a bit and definitely
made improvements, so I feel a lot more comfortable now. I
came in after three or four laps this afternoon because it
kept raining and getting wetter, so I said that's enough for
now, it was getting too much. You can go around but it's not
safe and you're not learning anything, so I thought it better
to come in and wait for the right time to go out again. This
morning we weren't too bad in the dry - race pace was pretty
good straight away. For sure we can improve the bike. We need
to improve traction a little bit, which we did this morning,
and we need to improve the turning a bit because I don't have
the same sensitivity I've had at other tracks. We pretty much
know what settings we need to change to make it turn a bit
harder and we should be all right, so it's looking good wet
or dry."
LORIS CAPIROSSI, 9th fastest, 1m 51.803s (rain: 2m
10.220s)
"We learned a lot today. This morning we compared the
new engine spec against the standard spec. I think the new
stuff has potential, the power delivery is already smoother
at low revs and we can improve it a lot more. This afternoon
we worked on the new spec, making some improvements, but clearly
the track conditions weren't the best for this kind of work,
even though the track wasn't so bad considering how hard it
was raining. There was so much water on the main straight
that the rear tyre was spinning a lot even when I shifted
into sixth. We still have a few things to fix but that's normal
when you have a lot of new ideas to test. I'm generally pretty
happy with today but I really hope we get two dry sessions
tomorrow so we can continue setting up the new spec. If not,
we probably won't race with it on Sunday."
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