The Pramac d’Antin team began its preparations for Sunday’s Czech Republic GP in Brno today as the MotoGP World Championship resumed action after the summer break.
The team is defending its colours this weekend with lead rider Alex Barros and Spanish reserve rider Ivan Silva, who is replacing the injured Alex Hofmann. Today’s work was focussed on setting up the Ducati Desmosedici with the Bridgestone tyres around the technically demanding Brno track in advance of Sunday’s 22-lap race in which the Italo-Spanish team is determined to recover some points missed in the previous races.
Alex Barros (1’59.738 – 18 laps):
“After the summer break, we started to work again today and I can finally say that I have completely recovered from my hand injury. This morning we started convinced to obtain a good lap time but we met some difficulties with grip levels. It is nothing particularly worrying, since we are still only at the first day and we have time and determination to recover. Already in the afternoon, during the second free practice session, I was able to improve my race pace and lower my lap time; this means that we are heading in the right direction and we must continue in this way. Today we focussed mainly on bike set-up and tomorrow we will look at testing and choosing our Bridgestone race tyres. ”
Ivan Silva (2’01.854 – 20 laps):
“I have already run at this track in MotoGP when I substituted for Alex Hofmann at Pramac d’Antin last year, but the bike was different, so I needed some time today to find the right feeling with the Desmosedici. Anyway I’m quite confident because during the afternoon practice, also thanks to the advice of my mechanics, I was able to lower my lap time by two seconds. I want to achieve a good lap time and tomorrow I hope to be faster. Above all, my aim is simply not to finish in last position on the classification. ”
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