Parkes and Foret fast in testing at Vallelunga
The Yamaha World Supersport Team arrived in Vallelunga with
a clear aim in mind and after exhaustive tests in high temperatures,
both Broc Parkes and Fabien Foret found real improvements
in the real-world race set-up of their Yamaha YZF-R6 machines.
Parkes finished the test outright second fastest but more
importantly he found an improved base set-up, even in the
hot conditions of a Roman summer. The Qatar race winner also
made good work in evaluating Pirelli’s latest batch
of development tyres.
Foret, who is not a fan of the Vallelunga circuit because
it features contrasting fast and ultra-slow sections, made
a set-up breakthrough on the final day, after working through
several options during this test.
Despite punishing track temperatures in the last session,
both Foret and Parkes improved on their previous best laps
times at the end of two hard days of action. Parkes was only
0.018 seconds from the fastest rider, with Foret only just
over a tenth behind his team-mate, making him third quickest
of all 17 riders.
Broc Parkes (2nd - 1’39.523 - 96 laps - Yamaha
World Supersport Team)
"It’s been a good test for us over two hard days
and the new tyres worked well on our bike. We came with a
target to make the bike more secure and still fast and we
found a set-up that let us do that. The boys in the garage
worked really hard so big thanks to them. We went faster at
the end and I was on course to make an even better lap until
I made a mistake and lost that last chance. But the test was
very good, despite the heat on the track, and I hope we can
take the things we found here forward to other races.”
Fabien Foret (3rd - 1’39.653 - 101 laps - Yamaha
World Supersport Team)
"In the end we made what felt like a small change but
it had a really big effect. We found that the new tyres were
working better and towards the end we tried something new,
which worked straight away. I was more than half a second
faster! This is not a track I enjoy so much, especially the
very slow parts, but we found something good and it is been
useful to have lots of new information.”
Wilco Zeelenberg (Team Manager, Yamaha World Supersport
Team)
"We got to where we wanted to be in the end but this
morning we struggled a bit. Fabien had a different problem
from Broc so we adjusted the bikes of each rider. Fabien is
still looking for something more but in the set-up we took
the bike to a place where we have never been. It seemed to
work for him, even though it was quite a big jump. It was
very interesting for Fabien to improve his previous best time
by eight tenths of a second, so we are pleased to have actually
found something new. But that is what testing is for. The
track temperature was unbelievable, more than 60°C to
start the session. The new tyres were good and we were happy
with them.”
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