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Dani Pedrosa topped the time sheets on the first day of testing at the Losail International Circuit on Qatar. The Qatar test will be the final test of the 2011 MotoGP preseason before the riders take to the track for the first race next week.
Pedrosa was joined at the top by his Repsol Honda teammate, Casey Stoner, who finished .143 seconds behind Pedrosa’s quickest lap of 1’56.271.
A third Honda came in before the boys from Yamaha. Hiroshi Aoyama finished with a 1’54.444 lap time for the San Carlo Honda Gresini team. Motorcycle News
Factory Yamaha riders Ben Spies and Jorge Lorenzo occupied fourth and fifth on the timesheets. Spies was just 0.292sec slower than Pedrosa, with reigning world champion Lorenzo 0.416sec behind.
Monster Yamaha Tech 3’s Colin Edwards moved ahead of third Repsol Honda rider Andrea Dovizioso to claim a late sixth place, with Valentino Rossi snatching eighth back from Ducati team-mate Nicky Hayden on his 57th and last lap of the night.
Seven time MotoGP world champion Rossi had earlier suffered a small fall and an further unplanned pit stop, due to burning rubber on the exhaust of his Desmosedici.
Rossi finished 0.767sec slower than 2010 title runner-up Pedrosa - meaning it was the first time he has been within one-second of the top as a Ducati rider, and also the first time he has finished higher than ninth as a Ducati rider. Yahoo! Eurosport UK
Randy de Puniet had a positive end to a tough day on the Pramac Racing GP11 machine, after the Frenchman had crashed twice. He escaped uninjured and put in a 1’57.143 right at the end to complete the top ten.
Marco Simoncelli (San Carlo Honda Gresini) was the last to get within a second of Pedrosa thanks to a 1’57.226. He was followed closely by Álvaro Bautista (Rizla Suzuki) who had planned to run a race simulation on both days, and Héctor Barbera (Mapfre Aspar Team).
Loris Capirossi’s adaptation to the Pramac Racing Ducati continued as he rounded out day one in 14h spot, just ahead of rookie Karel Abraham (Cardion AB Motoracing), also on the GP11, who was bidding to find the right balance between the feeling with the front and rear of his machine. The Czech rider was just over two-tenths ahead of fellow rookie Cal Crutchlow (Monster Yamaha Tech 3), whose aim was to learn the track under floodlights on his M1. LCR Honda’s Toni Elías completed the timesheet, with a best time of 1’58.250. Motogp.com
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