Vermeulen delighted by Suzuki's effort

After Kawasaki announced its withdrawal in January there was speculation that Suzuki could follow suit. The Japanese manufacturer swiftly denied the stories, although rumours of budget cuts continued through the winter, and has flown in testing since introducing its 2009 updates.

"Suzuki have done a lot of work in the off-season and we're very excited to see that," said Vermeulen.

"The economic situation is the same for all the manufacturers, but Suzuki have done a great job. They've worked really hard and we've had a lot of new development parts on all sorts of areas on the bike.

"It's not the perfect machine, it's never going to be, but things are going in the right direction."

The Australian now hopes that Suzuki can convert its strong winter form into race results.

"It's getting faster, it's easier to use the tyres, it's easier on the tyres and we're moving a little bit closer to the front and becoming more competitive," Vermeulen said.

"That's what we've been looking at doing so we're going to see what we're really like now. Hopefully we can still be at the pointy end when the races start."