Hopkins pleased with practice form

Hopkins took third in the afternoon session, one tenth of a second behind Loris Capirossi.

"I'm pretty pleased with how this afternoon's gone," Hopkins said.

"I didn't get a lot of practice this morning as the track was too wet and really dirty. We got some good laps towards the end of the last session and we have found some things we can work on tonight that should smooth a couple of areas out.

"The weather for tomorrow looks like it's going to be good and we are really looking forward to the weekend."

Team manager Paul Denning praised tyre supplier Bridgestone's preparations for the Turkish event.

"There had been a lot of discussion regarding tyres before we came to Istanbul, given that no teams had run one of the new 800s here," he said.

"It seems like Bridgestone has got its sums right based on initial performance and the onward progression seems to be continuing in very much the right direction."

Chris Vermeulen was also positive about the tyres' performance after going seventh quickest during a long run.

"I felt comfortable this afternoon and only used one set of tyres," he said.

"I set my quickest lap on the 23rd lap, which is further than race distance, and the tyres were still working well.

"Maybe tomorrow we can go out with a softer, grippier tyre and go a bit quicker."