The first day of practice for the French Grand Prix has been used by JiR Team Scot to evaluate new technical parts and materials and make choices for tomorrow’s practice and qualifying sessions. The circuit has been lightly modified and in some parts the Tarmac has been renewed. This has not changed the characteristics of the French circuit. Rider and team enjoyed a good morning session, although they didn’t make any improvements in time in the afternoon but instead worked on settings for the new equipment. Tomorrow will be crucial, but the weather is forecast to be very poor.
Cirano Mularoni – Team Manager JiR Team Scot
“The first day of practice is important to test the new materials from Honda and Michelin. Our work today was mainly dedicated to evaluating these new parts and what we could make with these new items: that’s why we weren’t really looking at a good lap time. Le Mans is a circuit that Andrea really likes and where he has had some fantastic results so this could be important for us. Tomorrow is also going to be important as we finalise the hard work we began today.”
Andrea Dovizioso – Rider JiR Team Scot MotoGP
HONDA RC212V
13th: 1’35”450
“Today we had a lot of things to try and we worked hard on final setting of the new clutch that Honda put at our disposal. Immediately my feeling is that it is smoother, but the final tuning has to be done tomorrow. I also tried some new Michelin tyres. We will definitely decide what to use tomorrow for both qualifying and the race, especially for the race when we consider that we need a good pace for all 28 laps! This morning we started very well with the seventh best time, but in the afternoon I was not going any faster and I was not looking at lap times as we evaluated our package. The condition of the track is good, we have some basic settings which are good everywhere but we need to make a step forward tomorrow because we need a good grid position for Sunday.”
Gianni Berti – Technical Co-ordinator JiR Team Scot
“We have completed a lot of work today and perhaps that has left us a little far from the leading riders, but we’re satisfied as the balance of the day shows the attention our technical partners are giving to us. In the main, we spent a lot of time making choices for the tyres that we will use tomorrow. Our target is to find the proper pace for the race. We have had some very positive feelings from Andrea about the new clutch that Honda has supplied us with and now we will fine-tune it for the race tomorrow. We are all looking forward to an important day tomorrow.”
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