Dani Pedrosa tops first day of Valencia post-season MotoGP test
Dani Pedrosa topped the first day of MotoGP testing at Valencia as a mixture of 800 and 1000cc machines took to the track
Honda riders Pedrosa and Casey Stoner, who had last ridden their 2012-spec machines at Misano in September, headed the timesheets for most of the day, with Stoner in front for the majority of the time.
It was Pedrosa though, who wound up fastest, clocking 1m32.186s on the fastest of his 40 laps, 0.136s up on his world champion team-mate, who suffered from excessive chatter on the new 2012-spec tyres during the day. Both RC123Vs featured revisions since the Misano test.
Ben Spies was the Honda riders' closest challenger, the American completed a marathon day of riding with his team-mate Jorge Lorenzo being still unfit to return to action following injury. He was a second off the pace on Yamaha's new M1.
Randy de Puniet made an impressive debut on Suzuki machinery, the Frenchman taking a 2011-spec 800cc bike to fourth spot, ahead of the new Tech 3 Yamaha and Ducati of Cal Crutchlow and Valentino Rossi respectively.
Andrea Dovizioso capped his first day as a Tech 3 employee with seventh spot, ahead of new Pramac Ducati rider Hector Barbera, also on a 1000cc bike.
New Moto2 champion Stefan Bradl rode LCR's 800cc Honda and was ninth quickest, while Karel Abraham completed the top 10 on his Cardion AB Ducati.
A number of new bikes from claiming rules teams were given a run-out. The quickest was the BQR-run Inmotec of former MotoGP rider Ivan Silva, while the new Suter (with a BMW engine) and Gapam chassis also featured on-track.
Pos Rider Team/Bike Time Gap 1. Dani Pedrosa Honda 1m32.186s 2. Casey Stoner Honda 1m32.322s + 0.136s 3. Ben Spies Yamaha 1m33.226s + 1.040s 4. Randy de Puniet Suzuki 1m33.544s + 1.358s 5. Cal Crutchlow Tech 3 Yamaha 1m33.652s + 1.466s 6. Valentino Rossi Ducati 1m33.857s + 1.671s 7. Andrea Dovizioso Tech 3 Yamaha 1m33.859s + 1.673s 8. Hector Barbera Pramac Ducati 1m34.174s + 1.988s 9. Stefan Bradl LCR Honda 1m34.330s + 2.144s 10. Karel Abraham Cardion AB Ducati 1m34.393s + 2.207s 11. Franco Battaini Ducati 1m35.371s + 3.185s 12. Kosuke Akiyoshi Honda 1m35.728s + 3.542s 13. Ivan Silva BQR Inmotec 1m37.159s + 4.973s 14. Carmelo Morales Laglise Suter 1m38.989s + 6.803s 15. Gianluca Nannelli Grillini Gapam 1m39.173s + 6.987s 16. Federico Sandi Grillini Gapam 1m39.827s + 7.641s
Be part of the Autosport community
Join the conversationShare Or Save This Story
Subscribe and access Autosport.com with your ad-blocker.
From Formula 1 to MotoGP we report straight from the paddock because we love our sport, just like you. In order to keep delivering our expert journalism, our website uses advertising. Still, we want to give you the opportunity to enjoy an ad-free and tracker-free website and to continue using your adblocker.
Top Comments