Rossi: Yamaha cannot blame surface

The former world champion was at least two seconds off the pace throughout practice, and while he is not happy with the surface, he accepts that the other teams and riders have handled the situation better than the Yamaha squad.

"The new asphalt is not so good but we can't blame this because the other riders don't seem to have the same problems as we do," said Rossi.

"We need to find some way to improve things and make the difference for tomorrow, so now we will have a meeting tonight and try to come up with some ideas."

Rossi added that Yamaha were completely lost during practice, where they tried several different solutions without success, and team boss Davide Brivio echoed his comments.

"We don't have any grip, especially in front, as we were very slow today," said Rossi. "We've tried a lot of tyres and different settings but so far we haven't made much progress."

Brivio added: "We definitely have a lot of work to do. The new surface means the conditions are quite different and we are suffering from a lack of grip.

"We need to look at what we've found out today and come up with some ideas tonight in order to find a combination of settings and tyres that works on this surface and in these conditions."