Copyright 2003, Roadracing World Publishing, Inc.

The biggest problems for Seven Stars Honda’s Nicky Hayden so far at the Suzuka 8-Hours are learning how to stretch the fuel load of his Honda RC51 and remembering how to deal with lapped riders.

“Right now, we’re just trying to work on my fuel consumption,” Hayden told Roadracingworld.com Thursday on Suzuka’s pit lane. “That’s the most important thing, to get my mileage up there. I’m braking too deep right now, and that’s kind of hurting me.”

The other big problem Hayden faces is dealing with the backmarkers he thought he had left behind in AMA Pro Racing.

“I kind of forgot about riding around backmarkers since I started riding GP. They just weren’t there anymore,” laughed Hayden. “I didn’t notice it, but coming back here where there’s a lot of backmarkers it’s a big deal.

“There’s a lot of different classes here – production bikes and some quite slow bikes. I forgot how much it sucks to come up on a guy on a completely different bike. I’ve already almost cleaned one guy out. So I definitely have to get into the rhythm of going through lappers again. That’s something I have to work on, and my in and out laps. I need to work on those, too.”

Hayden said his team is planning to do the 8-hour race on six fuel stops in between seven, 75-minute riding stints. And four of those stints will be Hayden’s.

“Sure, it’s not going to be easy,” said Hayden. “If we go 1:15 stints and it’s so humid here, it’s definitely going to be a chore. After riding the V5 (Honda RC211V MotoGP bike), this thing here is a lot more mellow. So it’s kind of like not hard to hang on to. The biggest thing is to stay focused in traffic and not take one of the slower riders out.”