Melandri rues 'wasted' day at Jerez

The Marlboro Ducati rider, who barely managed to get within three seconds of teammate Casey Stoner's time, partly put the blame on the fact that the morning's crash prevented him from using the right tyre for the conditions.

"Today has been the classic 'wasted' day as far as the test is concerned, because there's not a lot you can do in these conditions," explained the Italian.

"This morning we tried out the wet setting and we were making improvements when I suffered my first crash with the Ducati, which was quite heavy but nothing too serious.

"In the first part of the qualifying session I was able to go quite fast straight away but after a quick pit-stop I wasn't able to improve my time by much - just over a tenth on the last lap - which was partly due to the fact that in the crash I'd destroyed one of the tyres that worked well in these conditions and I didn't have a new one to put on.

"With the weather getting worse we decided to finish for the day and hope for better weather so that we can continue our work tomorrow."