Rossi says more speed needed

The Italian ended the day sixth fastest overall, and is hoping that set-up changes will improve the handling of his bike - especially under braking and with the grip from the rear tyre.

"Today has gone more or less okay for the first day and, as is usual on a Friday, we spent most of the day working on the set-up of our M1," said Rossi.

"This morning was okay and then this afternoon we made some more progress and we found out some interesting things, which we hope will help us tomorrow and on Sunday. Despite this we still have quite a lot to improve on; we can and must be faster.

"As for the tyres, the front tyre seems to be working quite well here but we have some problems at the moment with the rear, especially in acceleration. After a few laps the grip is less and then when you open the gas the bike is sliding quite a lot.

"This was the main problem we were trying to fix throughout the day, and one of the things we did was to make a small change to the parameters of the traction control.

"This seemed to help and in the last ten minutes this afternoon we felt some improvement and the situation was better. Regarding the set-up, we have also worked on the mapping and engine braking; I still have a couple of corners where the engine braking needs to be improved in order to give me enough confidence when I'm coming into the corner.

"We had some new things to try out today, including a new fairing which is an evolution of the one that I used in Mugello. It has definitely helped us a bit, although the advantage it gives us is only small.

"We've tried pretty much all the new items we have here and tomorrow we will have more time to continue in this way to work out what will help us on Sunday.

"We will also concentrate on improving the durability of our race tyres with Michelin, because, as usual, this is going to be very important on Sunday. I hope that the weather will be good tomorrow because at the moment the track is quite slippery and in places it's tricky to ride."

Teammate Colin Edwards had more difficulties, ending up 13th fastest after struggling for grip.

"My main problem today was basically that I didn't have much grip," he said. "We've tested pretty much all the tyres we have available to us but we haven't yet been able to find a solution that enables me to ride the bike how I want to.

"At the moment we don't have one that I feel would work for the race, so we need to concentrate on fixing this problem tomorrow. The plan now is to take the one that's working best and turn the bike around to find a compromise that gives us enough traction.

"I improved a tiny bit this afternoon but everyone else improved a lot more! It's frustrating but I have faith in the team and I am sure we will come up with something tomorrow."