Top ten fight-back for KONICA MINOLTA Honda in China
KONICA MINOLTA Honda bounced back from yesterday’s
practice session to record the tenth fastest time at the Shanghai
race circuit today. Team rider Shinya Nakano slashed nearly
three seconds off his lap time around the long 3.387mile circuit
after the Team reverted back to a previous machine set-up.
The 29-year-old former 250cc GP runner-up recorded a best
time of 2’00.157” and was lying as high as fourth
during the hour-long session. Weather predictions for tomorrow’s
22-lap race aren’t looking positive, with rain forecast
for the afternoon.
Gianluca Montiron – Team Manager KONICA MINOLTA
Honda
“We would like to be higher up – of course we
would – but compared to yesterday we are happy. We have
gone back to a setting used in the last two races and by doing
so Shinya has recovered the feeling he had with the machine.
For tomorrow’s race I think it will be important to
get away from the line well and be as near as possible to
the lead group. The weather forecast says rain for tomorrow,
but they did say that for today too, so who knows? At the
moment we have to improve the performance of our overall technical
package, as it doesn’t allow Shinya to ride as he would
like. It doesn’t give him the feeling and feedback he
needs to have the confidence to push hard and go fast. After
this race we need to analyse the situation with our technical
partners and find a way forward. The positive for the Team
is that we can see that the direction we went in at the start
of the season with set-up was the right one.”
Shinya Nakano – Rider, KONICA MINOLTA Honda
(40 laps – 2’ 00.157” – 10th position)
“We had a meeting after practice yesterday and decided
to go back to our previous standard settings which helped.
I also tried to improve my riding and checked all my braking
points and found my lap times getting better and better. I
think we made too many changes yesterday so the Team helped
me and things improved when we reverted to the previous set-up.
We also had improved top speed today thanks to some gearing
changes. We have found a tyre for the race tomorrow, which
should be good as I have quite a good feeling with it. Rain
is forecast for tomorrow, but I would prefer a dry race –
I think everybody does!”
Giulio Bernardelle – Technical Director, KONICA
MINOLTA Honda
“Our standard settings that we had from the last couple
of races seem to be the best compromise for Shinya at the
moment. We have no chance to change the machine characteristics
of the new Honda RC212V so things aren’t perfect but
Shinya’s confident he can push harder with the settings
we have and rider confidence is vital. With the new 800cc
machine many riders’ comments seems to be the same and
we’ve discussed this many times with HRC technicians.
Other riders can mask the bike’s characteristics, particularly
on race tyres, but it’s a trait of this bike and at
this stage in the season there’s no possibility to change
it. After our good wet-weather test after Jerez, I think we
are in good shape if it rains, so let’s wait and see
what the weather does tomorrow.”
GP of China – Qualifying practice classification
1) Valentino Rossi Yamaha 1’ 58.424”
2) John Hopkins Suzuki 1’ 59.315”
3) Colin Edwards Yamaha 1’ 59.406”
4) Casey Stoner Ducati 1’ 59.516”
5) Dani Pedrosa Honda 1’ 59.602”
10) Shinya Nakano Honda 2’ 00.157”
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