Lorenzo 'patient' over Yamaha form

Yamaha was outpaced by Honda in France and Lorenzo could only finish in fourth place. The current points leader believes that was just a one-off performance rather than the start of a trend.

"Le Mans was a really tough weekend for us," said Lorenzo. "We never had a great set-up on the bike - too many wheelies. But we did the maximum.

"We tried to stay with the Hondas at the beginning of the race. I pushed 100 per cent. I wasted all my energy At the end of the race I lost so many seconds because my physical condition was a little low."

He said Yamaha was putting in a huge effort to improve and get on terms with the currently pacesetting Hondas, and he had no doubt his team would succeed.

"We are working to improve the bike," Lorenzo said. "We are working to gain horsepower, to try to improve the set-up and I think in the future we are going to get it. It's a question of time and patience, and we are working a lot."

He added that the characteristics of this weekend's Catalunya venue would naturally suit the 2011 Yamaha better than Le Mans.

"It doesn't have so many slow corners and so much acceleration, which is the worst point we have now because of the wheelies," Lorenzo explained. "Obviously I prefer the fast corners where I can put my cornering speed on track. So it should be a pretty good track for us compared to Le Mans, for sure."