Photo: motogp.com
Normally, I’d throw in the classic movie cliché “It looks like we’ll never know,” seeing how the final test of the pre-season ended abruptly at the Losail circuit in Qatar. That is, because the rain sent the teams home before the riders could do proper race simulations during the third day of the test, as it was expected.
With none of the teams attempting proper long runs, the third day at Losail was expected to shed more light on Ducati’s performance. These race simulations were important for both Borgo Panigale and for the rest of the teams (especially Honda and Yamaha) as they could determine whether the speed the GP15 machines showed on Day 1 and Day 2 was sustainable throughout an entire round.
Lorenzo and Rossi admitted they had certain issues with their bikes, and could not pose a real threat to the leaders. With the top 14 riders separated by 0.9 seconds in the combined standings sheet for day 1 and 2, you can imagine that the kick-off race might bring quite a thrilling action… and this is exactly what we were hoping for.
“I believe they’re not using the extra-soft tire to avoid creating a scare, because their lap-times would quickly drop by one second! At the end of the day, it's clear that our rivals are the Yamaha riders and Dani (Pedrosa) - they are our rivals for the championship. At some specific point, the Ducati will be there at the front but they have this 'handicap' of losing some of their advantages if they get good results, so yeah, I know who my rivals are and who I have to keep a close eye on,” Marquez tells motogp.com.
We now have less than a fortnight until we will see how all the changes which took place during the winter and the new machinery performs in the first race. Practice starts Thursday 26 March at Losail, with the Race scheduled for Sunday 29 March.
The opening race in Qatar will show how fast Ducati is
This leaves us with some extra waiting time ahead and makes the debut race of the 2015 championship even more interesting to watch. So far, Ducati managed to have a rider at the top of the time sheets in the first two days of the Losail test. Borgo Panigale had a 1-2 with Iannone and Dovizioso in Day 1, with “Desmo” Dovi being the fastest on Day 2, and Iannone third, 13 thousandths of a second slower than Pedrosa.Lorenzo and Rossi admitted they had certain issues with their bikes, and could not pose a real threat to the leaders. With the top 14 riders separated by 0.9 seconds in the combined standings sheet for day 1 and 2, you can imagine that the kick-off race might bring quite a thrilling action… and this is exactly what we were hoping for.
Marc Marquez says that he still sees Yamaha riders as the main rivals
Unable to maintain the flow of top-ranking position in the tests, reigning champion Marc Marquez and having to leave the spot to Andrea Dovizioso is still more “afraid” of Yamaha than he is of Ducati.“I believe they’re not using the extra-soft tire to avoid creating a scare, because their lap-times would quickly drop by one second! At the end of the day, it's clear that our rivals are the Yamaha riders and Dani (Pedrosa) - they are our rivals for the championship. At some specific point, the Ducati will be there at the front but they have this 'handicap' of losing some of their advantages if they get good results, so yeah, I know who my rivals are and who I have to keep a close eye on,” Marquez tells motogp.com.
We now have less than a fortnight until we will see how all the changes which took place during the winter and the new machinery performs in the first race. Practice starts Thursday 26 March at Losail, with the Race scheduled for Sunday 29 March.
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