A tough three days
The Repsol Honda team made the most of limited track time today as intermittent rain affected the final day.s testing at the Sepang International Circuit in Malaysia. Work continued on development of the RC211V that will contest the 2006 MotoGP championship.
Nicky Hayden was involved in comparison testing two versions of the RC211V, but was frustrated by heavy rain intervening at exactly the wrong moments. The plan for a longer race simulation on the new-spec RC211V also fell to the weather. However the three days of testing did provide useful data for the team. Development of the works Repsol Hondas will continue at the next test in Barcelona on March 3-5.

Hayden`s new team-mate Dani Pedrosa was able to test a modified chassis on his RC211V for the first time, further adding to the 20- year-old.s experience of MotoGP machinery.

Before the testing resumes in Barcelona the riders will head to Japan for the official launch party for Honda.s MotoGP season on February 20.

Nicky Hayden - 2m 02.86s. Laps completed: 47
« It`s been a tough three days going from bike to bike, and with so many things to test it got a little bit confusing. And the weather. I know it wasn.t helping anybody else out but I swear it seemed like every time we wanted to do some back to back testing it started raining. That.s frustrating because it leaves us with some unanswered questions. The new bike has a lot of potential, but as soon as I jump on the other bike you look at the stopwatch and the lap times come a little bit easier. We.re not in the best position, but we.ve got a lot of good people around here working hard and we.ll get there. The next two tests in Barcelona and Jerez are always fun, it.s an exciting time of year and we.re going to keep working from what we.ve learnt here. »

Dani Pedrosa - 2m 02.68s. Laps completed: 35


« Today was a difficult day with a lot of waiting around because of the rain. The wet track took some time dry and some more time to get back to a good grip level, and then it rained again. So today we didn.t really make much progress. But the test has been good. I.ve tried some new things on the bike and gained some good experience. »

Makoto Tanaka - Team Manager
« We made progress, it was a positive test, though again we were frustrated by the weather today. Dani tried some modifications to the chassis and he gave some good feedback. It was difficult for Nicky because we couldn.t test as much as we.d have liked and the rain stopped us doing a longer run yet he found a good direction for the bike. Now we move on to Barcelona where we will continue to develop the RC211V. »


Tags: malaysia, repsol-honda, hayden, pedrosa, test,