Vermeulen frustrated by early crash

Vermeulen had high hopes for the weekend given his excellent record at Laguna Seca, having taken pole on his MotoGP debut at the track in 2006 and finished on the podium for the past two years.

But he fell at Turn 2 within the first few minutes of the opening practice session and was unable to get his primary bike back to the pits. He was eighth fastest on his spare by the end of the afternoon, but was unable to complete the team's planned programme.

"I was really looking forward to coming back to Laguna as it is obviously a track I enjoy, but it wasn't the start I wanted," Vermeulen admitted.

"On the fourth or fifth lap I was just starting to build up my pace and as I entered Turn 2 I locked the front wheel and went down. Unfortunately the bike was on the outside of the circuit so I was unable to get it back for the rest of the session.

"I got back to the pits and went out on the other bike but it was set up very differently - geometry wise - and it didn't quite work as well as we'd hoped around here."

Vermeulen's team-mate Loris Capirossi was also unhappy, having ended the day in 12th.

"We tried to do something big with the setting today and we started with two very different bikes," he said. "We never really found the best solution with either bike and went back to the first one and modified that a bit to try and find the best settings for this track.

"On the last run we did improve a bit but we still need to work harder and improve a lot more tomorrow."