Photo: motogp.com
With Marc Marquez missing the second Sepang test of 2014, Repsol Honda has to rely on Dani Pedrosa to gather as much data as possible before the season begins, and the Spaniard seems to have found his pace in Malaysia, despite his troubles with the jetlag.
Pedrosa ended day 2 at Sepang in the leading position of the timesheets, but still 0.039 seconds short of the 2-minute mark his younger team-mate went beyond two weeks ago.
Still, the most interesting part of the Sepang tests is seeing Aleix Espargaro, the standing Open Class (former CRT) champion consistently lapping excellent times and being very close to the leading riders. Espargaro now rides with the NGM Forward Racing livery and uses an FTR-frame bike with a leased Yamaha M1 engine.
We knew the combination was cool straight from Valencia, as both the elder of the Espargaro brothers and his team mate Colin Edwards were thrilled to learn how fast the bikes were. And in the second day of this Sepang test, the Spaniard’s machine was only 0.281s slower than Pedrosa’s, allowing him to also do a race simulation to see the bike perform in prolonged stress conditions.
Yesterday’s top man, Alvaro Bautista was third, 0.461s slower than Pedrosa, but still leading Valentino Rossi by a tenth of a second. Andrea Dovizioso posted another surprising position, finishing the day 5th fastest, followed by Stefan Bradl, Cal Crutchlow, Pol Espargaro, Jorge Lorenzo and Bradley Smith for the top 10.
Team Yamaha Tech3 received the seamless gearboxes and they were received well by young Espargaro and Crutchlow, the latter jumping from position 11 to the 7th. Sepang will see one more day of testing tomorrow, and by the end of the day Ducati must make their final decision, choosing between the Factory and the Open entries. Suzuki and Randy De Puniet also improved their ranking, climbing form 17th to the 15th position today.
Last but not least, a big hand to Colin Edwards, the oldest rider on the MotoGP grid, as today he celebrates his… drums rolling, 40th birthday!
Still, the most interesting part of the Sepang tests is seeing Aleix Espargaro, the standing Open Class (former CRT) champion consistently lapping excellent times and being very close to the leading riders. Espargaro now rides with the NGM Forward Racing livery and uses an FTR-frame bike with a leased Yamaha M1 engine.
We knew the combination was cool straight from Valencia, as both the elder of the Espargaro brothers and his team mate Colin Edwards were thrilled to learn how fast the bikes were. And in the second day of this Sepang test, the Spaniard’s machine was only 0.281s slower than Pedrosa’s, allowing him to also do a race simulation to see the bike perform in prolonged stress conditions.
Yesterday’s top man, Alvaro Bautista was third, 0.461s slower than Pedrosa, but still leading Valentino Rossi by a tenth of a second. Andrea Dovizioso posted another surprising position, finishing the day 5th fastest, followed by Stefan Bradl, Cal Crutchlow, Pol Espargaro, Jorge Lorenzo and Bradley Smith for the top 10.
Team Yamaha Tech3 received the seamless gearboxes and they were received well by young Espargaro and Crutchlow, the latter jumping from position 11 to the 7th. Sepang will see one more day of testing tomorrow, and by the end of the day Ducati must make their final decision, choosing between the Factory and the Open entries. Suzuki and Randy De Puniet also improved their ranking, climbing form 17th to the 15th position today.
Last but not least, a big hand to Colin Edwards, the oldest rider on the MotoGP grid, as today he celebrates his… drums rolling, 40th birthday!
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