Team Suzuki is making solid progress in preparation of the 2015 MotoGP comeback, and booked a three-day test at the Circuit of the Americas after the Sunday race. While the Monday session was ruined by heavy rain and a very dirty track, house of Hamamatsu finally managed to get to test their machines Tuesday through Wednesday.
Though riding in much lower temperatures than what the Sunday race had, Suzuki’s main test pilot Randy De Puniet managed to get very close to the laps Honda’s production racers posted, but still some 3 seconds off the fastest lap Marquez run on Sunday. Still, given the worse conditions and the fact that Suzuki is still experimenting with their software for the Marelli ECU and two different chassis options, we’re clearly looking forward to more interesting results, and better than the 2m06s41.
Long-time Suzuki rider and former World Champion Kevin Schwantz was present at the COTA tests and rode the XRH-1 prototype himself, posting 2m12s75. Though not exactly a top MotoGP lap time, Schwantz’ time is impressive, given the fact that he is not acquainted with the current prototypes, and even more – he’s 50. The COTA ambassador put in only 11 laps, compared to De Puniet who put in 56.
Kevin Schwantz also rode the Yoshimura GSX-R1000 he will ride at the Suzuka 8-Hour race later in July and added: “After having ridden the MotoGP machine, I now appreciate much-more the GSX-R and I want to continue to work on that now to prepare for my race at Suzuka in July. So tomorrow I will only ride the GSX-R.”
Team boss Davide Brivio is still waiting for more testing results in the first half of the MotoGP season before deciding where and when the Suzuki wildcard appearances will take place. As for the rider line-up Suzuki is eyeing for 2015, still no words, though we can guess that De Puniet will be aboard one of the bikes.
The videos have been shot at Sepang but Suzuki only uploaded them this week. Anyway, they’re as fresh for the public as it gets.
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