Suzuki riders confident of improvement

Vermeulen, coming off two trying weekends in Japan and Australia, showed improved pace in both sessions at Sepang, finishing the day eighth fastest. The Australian was happy with his Bridgestone tyres, despite struggling for grip at the start of the morning session.

"It was a bit of a strange day here at Sepang, there was a new surface and it was quite slippery in the beginning, not just for me but for everyone.

"Bridgestone did a great job with the tyre selection and we found some compounds that worked in our allocation - they seemed to behave very well on this surface and have a good durability.

"This afternoon started wet and it was hard to find a dry line, but my team improved the bike a lot during the session and every time I went out it seemed better and more comfortable to ride.

"Every lap I felt like I was getting quicker as I got used to the new surface. Hopefully we can improve more tomorrow and move further up the order."

Teammate John Hopkins was ninth fastest, one place behind Vermeulen. He also commented on the lack of grip that the track gave at the start of the day's running, and felt confident there was still plenty of speed to be found.

"The track surface this morning was extremely bad, it was very slick and like glass out there.

"This afternoon with the wet weather we only really got half a session with a dry track, but once we got up to speed the surface was a lot better than this morning and as more rubber gets down on it it will just improve more.

"We went through some tyre testing and a bit of set-up, but we will be working hard tomorrow and hopefully it will stay dry and we will be a lot stronger. I am pretty positive that we will be able to improve on our position by a decent amount."