FIM MotoGP World Championship Sachsenring, Germany July 14 Friday’s Best Combined Practice Times: 1. Marco MELANDRI (Honda) 1:23.145, Michelin 2. Dani PEDROSA (Honda) 1:23.486, Michelin 3. Loris CAPIROSSI (Ducati) 1:23.490, Bridgestone 4. Nicky HAYDEN (Honda) 1:23.525, Michelin 5. Kenny Lee ROBERTS (Roberts/Honda) 1:23.676, Michelin 6. John HOPKINS (Suzuki) 1:23.693, Bridgestone 7. Valentino ROSSI (Yamaha) 1:23.871, Michelin 8. Casey STONER (Honda) 1:23.889, Michelin 9. Sete GIBERNAU (Ducati) 1:24.022, Bridgestone 10. Makoto TAMADA (Honda) 1:24.030, Michelin 11. Colin EDWARDS (Yamaha) 1:24.100, Michelin 12. Carlos CHECA (Yamaha) 1:24.116, Dunlop 13. Shinya NAKANO (Kawasaki) 1:24.190, Bridgestone 14. Randy DE PUNIET (Kawasaki) 1:24.582, Bridgestone 15. Toni ELIAS (Honda) 1:24.626, Michelin 16. Alex HOFMANN (Ducati) 1:25.092, Dunlop 17. Chris VERMEULEN (Suzuki) 1:25.293, Bridgestone 18. Jose Luis CARDOSO (Ducati) 1:25.707, Dunlop 19. James ELLISON (Yamaha) 1:25.833, Dunlop More, from a press release issued by Kawasaki Racing Team: KAWASAKI SEEK ELUSIVE SACHSENRING SET-UP Shinya Nakano and Randy de Puniet remain confident that Sachsenring is a circuit that suits the characteristics of their Ninja ZX-RR MotoGP machines, despite the fact that set-up problems during today’s free practice sessions left both Kawasaki pilots further down the timesheet than expected. Nakano finished this afternoon’s free practice session thirteenth fastest, while his Kawasaki teammate, de Puniet, was one place further back in fourteenth. While yesterday’s pre-event promotions were blessed with sunshine and 30-degree temperatures, overcast conditions and sporadic rain showers greeted Nakano and De Puniet as they arrived at the Sachsenring circuit this morning for the opening day of practice ahead of Sunday’s 30-lap race. With track temperatures lower than predicted, Nakano and de Puniet struggled to find a set-up to suit the conditions during today’s two practice sessions, with both riders complaining of a lack of rear traction that stopped them from carrying the high corner speed necessary for a fast lap of the tight and twisty Sachsenring circuit. Both riders will revisit their chassis and engine management settings together with their respective crews tonight, but Kawasaki’s Technical Manager, Naoya Kaneko, is confident that small changes to set-up will pay dividends tomorrow, when the track temperature is again expected to rise. Shinya Nakano: 13th – 1’24.190 “We were expecting a lot better from today, but we’ve had a few problems that we weren’t really expecting and we’ve ended up a lot lower down the timesheet than we were hoping for. We need to sit down tonight and look at changing both our chassis balance and also our engine settings to improve our situation. At the moment the power comes in a little bit too aggressively and this makes the bike a little bit nervous and causes some pumping from the rear going into the turns, which nearly caused me to highside a couple of times today. We have some options on tyre choice, as well as some ideas on how to improve the chassis set-up, and I’m confident that we will see an improvement tomorrow. I think some small changes will make a big difference, which, in turn, will give me the confidence in the bike that you need here at Sachsenring – especially for the downhill corners like the right-hander at turn eight.” Randy de Puniet: 14th – 1’24.582 “At the start of this afternoon’s session I immediately saw a one second improvement in my lap time, but then when I started to push for further improvements that’s when I started to struggle with the bike. Halfway through the session I made a mistake and crashed at turn one without injury, but when I got back on track with my number two bike I just didn’t feel confident exiting the turns because the rear tyre would spin up as soon as I touched the throttle. Through the slower turns I just didn’t have the confidence to open the throttle when I wanted to, as again, the rear would just spin up straight away. As a result, I was losing time through every turn, which is why we finished today only fourteenth fastest. Overall today hasn’t been such a good start, but we will look at our set-up overnight to see if we can find a solution and I’m confident that we will see an improvement tomorrow.” Naoya Kaneko: Technical Manager “Today both riders were struggling with the feeling and the level of grip from the rear of the bike, which meant that they were unable to carry corner speed, nor get on the gas as early and as hard as they would have liked out of the turn. Tonight and tomorrow we need to focus on finding a good combination of rear tyre and suspension settings for this track, in order to instil more confidence in both riders. At a track like Sachsenring, where the bike spends a lot of time banked over on part throttle, even a small improvement in this area can lead to a big improvement in lap times.” More, from a press release issued by Ducati Marlboro Team: GOOD START FOR DUCATI MARLBORO TEAM AT SACHSENRING The Ducati Marlboro Team was getting back to normal at the Sachsenring today, returning to its original 2006 line-up of Loris Capirossi and Sete Gibernau, following two events without Gibernau, who broke his left collarbone at last month’s Catalan GP. But neither Capirossi, who was injured in the same accident, nor Gibernau are back to 100 per cent fitness yet. Capirossi’s Desmosedici GP6s are adorned with the Italian tricolour this weekend to celebrate the Italian football team’s victory in last Sunday’s World Cup final, staged a few hours away in Berlin. Nevertheless Capirossi put in an impressive performance in this afternoon’s second practice session, clocking the third fastest lap, just 0.345 seconds off ‘pole position’. Gibernau also rode superbly, running ninth quickest, only 0.877 seconds off ‘pole’ despite discomfort from his left collarbone, which was screwed and plated after last month’s crash. Unluckily for the Spaniard, the Sachsenring is an anti-clockwise circuit with more than twice as many lefts as rights, which places extra stress on his injury. LORIS CAPIROSSI, 3rd fastest, 1m 23.490s “I’m still getting some pain from my chest at some points of there track where I have to make certain movements. But otherwise I can almost ride normally. We made a big modification to the set-up from the morning session to this afternoon which worked well, so already we’re not so bad on race pace.” “We came here expecting it to be very hot but today was cooler so we ran softer tyres than we had expected. I used the same front throughout the afternoon session and did 18 laps with the same rear, running 23.7s near the end of the run. We expect tomorrow to be hotter which will allow us to test the tyres that Bridgestone made especially for this track. If we can improve tomorrow we can be competitive for the race. I lost a lot of points at the last three races, so I need to recover them. I’m very happy to carry the Italian flag here because our national team did a great job last weekend. I will try to do my best here.” SETE GIBERNAU, 9th fastest, 1m 24.022s “It’s good to be back and pain-wise I’m okay, better than I expected to be honest. The collarbone bothers me a bit, I’m aware of the pain when I’m riding but it takes nothing away from me, that’s the good point. The only thing that worries me right now is the strength of the left shoulder because I have no strength through the left-handers and there are a lot of lefts here. Right now I can do four or five laps and after that I’m done. But this is my first day on the bike, hopefully tomorrow we will be a bit better.” “I did do some training while I was away but it was inevitably limited and you can only really judge your strength when you’re on the bike because this is the real test. The bike is working not so bad but right now it’s more a battle to get me back into riding, getting used to the speeds and adapting myself to riding with this injury.” Afternoon session temperatures: Ambient: 20 degrees. Track: 27 degrees More, from a press release issued by Bridgestone Motorsport: CAPIROSSI TURNS UP THE HEAT IN GERMANY An ever resurgent Loris Capirossi finished the opening day of practice for this weekend’s German Grand Prix with the third fastest time (1m23.490s) to be the highest placed of the six Bridgestone-shod riders. Capirossi’s team-mate Sete Gibernau, making his return to race weekend action after the Catalan Grand Prix crash one month ago, concluded Sachsenring practice in ninth position (1m24.022s). The Ducati riders amassed 93 laps of the 3.67km track between them and look set to play a significant role in this weekend’s race. Suzuki’s John Hopkins took sixth place in the combined practice standings (1m23.693s), just two-tenths adrift of Capirossi’s time. Hopkins will be looking to add more points to his championship tally on Sunday having broken into the top ten as a result of the British GP a fortnight ago. Fellow Suzuki rider Chris Vermeulen (1m25.092s) had a difficult day on his first trip to the Sachsenring and was classified 17th at the end of the second session. Sachsenring plays host to the Bavaria-based Kawasaki Racing Team’s home grand prix this weekend. Riders Shinya Nakano and Randy de Puniet put in a solid performance on the opening day with Nakano (1m24.190s) in 13th and De Puniet (1m24.582s) in 14th despite a crash midway through the second of today’s sessions. Bridgestone developed special harder compound tyres for use in this weekend’s GP, which perform better with higher track temperatures than greeted riders today. With the track today in excess of twenty degrees cooler compared to yesterday and lower than the forecast currently predicts for the remainder of the weekend, results from today’s practice may prove inconclusive. Bridgestone is still optimistic for a good result this weekend and has tried to cover all bases where the weather is concerned with alternative compounds also at teams’ disposal in case Mother Nature opts to intervene on Saturday. Shinji Aoki, Assistant Manager Motorcycle Race Tire Development: “Again, the weather has dictated our results from the opening day. We arrived to glorious summer sunshine yesterday which was in line with our expectations, but mysteriously the temperatures have dipped today. The specific tyre compound we used today was intended for track temperatures around 40 degrees Celsius, so we did not get the desired effect on asphalt some ten degrees cooler. For that reason, it was pleasing to see Loris and John still able to lap within half-a-second of the pace. We expect an upturn in temperature from tomorrow which will hopefully lead to a consequent improvement in performance and place each of our teams in a position to challenge the frontrunners. As usual, we have an hour of practice tomorrow morning during which to reassess the situation and to get ourselves ready Sunday’s race. Qualifying will play an important role in that with the difficulty in overtaking at this track, so we are aiming to get on the front row for the tenth time in succession tomorrow afternoon.” More, from a press release issued by Pramac D’Antin MotoGP: POSITIVE RETURN FOR ALEX HOFMANN ON HIS HOME TRACK, CARDOSO IS CONFIDENT TOO However the weather conditions were quite unstable today, both the sessions of free practice have been on dry track. The atmosphere at the Sachsenring Circuit is always particular and there already was thousands of fans to follow the riders on track today. ALEX HOFMANN is racing at home, this can be seen by the determination with which he faced these first practice sessions. The German rider, willing to make a good result in front of his public, classified himself in 16th position, while his teammate, JOSE LUIS CARDOSO, is 18th. All the data is being studied now, to get ready for the second day of practice and define the best set-up for Sunday’s race. ALEX HOFMANN #66 (16th – 1’25.092): “I’m happy to “race at home”, because it’s my national GP and also because I’m back with my Team. Obviously, it’s always quite difficult to get back with your rhythm immediately but I’m confident. The tyres have improved, I can stay longer with the other riders and I’m having more fun. Tomorrow, we will try some modifications and I hope to improve my feeling to ride in a better way and lower my best laptime. In some corners of the track, we already found a good balance of the motorcycle and in other ones, we still need to find the best set-up especially on the front. We will analyze all the data to go on improving more and more”. JOSE LUIS CARDOSO #30 (18th – 1’25.707): “I like this track. There are some modifications to make on the bike for tomorrow but, generally, things are operating quite good. I will make the maximum tomorrow, I want to improve myself and I’m confident because I have a good feeling on the motorcycle. The only pity is to have crashed in the last lap, my mechanics will have to work a lot to get my bike ready for tomorrow, I’m really sorry about it”. EMANUELE MARTINELLI – Track Engineer of Alex Hofmann: “I could say that, after all, today’s practice is to be considered quite positive. HOFMANN, after his experience in the Official DUCATI Team, has to get back his feeling with the DESMOSEDICI GP06 “Sat.” and the DUNLOP tyres. From the last races, our distance from the first riders is lower. There have been less difficulties with the tyres, DUNLOP has made a small step ahead. We know where we need to concentrate our work tomorrow: in the last part of the track, HOFMANN needs more feeling with the front and we need to work on the suspensions. It will be useful to study all the data we collected today, to find valid solutions and improve ourselves during the last practice sessions. Anyway, the whole Team has been working very good and I’m confident for tomorrow”. More, from a press release issued by Camel Yamaha Team: ROSSI AND EDWARDS BEGIN TOUGH SET-UP JOB AT SACHSENRING The Camel Yamaha Team began their preparations for the German Grand Prix at the Sachsenring today with riders Valentino Rossi and Colin Edwards working hard to adjust their YZR-M1 machines to the tortuous demands of the MotoGP World Championship’s shortest and slowest circuit. The first day of free practice was held in cloudy yet warm conditions of around 20ºC, with the threat of storms hanging ominously over the circuit throughout the day but thankfully not progressing beyond a couple of spells of light rainfall as the riders squeezed every available minute out of the two hour-long sessions. Both Rossi and Edwards admitted running into difficulties as they adjusted the base setting of the bike, which so far hasn’t proven as well suited to this circuit as it has to faster tracks such as Donington, Assen, Mugello and Catalunya in recent weeks. The Italian ran sixth fastest in the morning session, with the American ninth, but they were both unable to match the progress made by their rivals in the afternoon and they slid marginally down the time sheets at the end of the day Rossi ending up seventh with Edwards in eleventh. Both riders face a crucial day of set-up work tomorrow as they prepare for the tenth round of the season on Sunday. VALENTINO ROSSI (7th 1’23.871; 43 laps) “We knew before we came here that this was not one of my favourite circuits and that it was always going to be a big effort from the first day. Unfortunately that is proving to be the case and I have not got comfortable with the bike or the track today. We are trying a whole ‘sack’ of things to make the bike better but we keep running into problems and haven’t found the best way to work yet. Luckily we still have two hours tomorrow to do this so we hope the weather stays dry because we need all that track time to work on the bike. Anyway I am still confident because Jerry and the engineers have shown in the past few races when I have been injured that they have a great ability to set the bike up using a minimal amount of data. Tomorrow we will have to stay concentrated and see what we can do. It already looks like it will be a tough battle on Sunday but the tough ones are always the most fun!” COLIN EDWARDS (11th 1’24.100; 33 laps) “We’re struggling. The bike feels a bit rough in a few sections and we need to make some drastic changes tomorrow to get it working how we want. The bike and I are not getting along with the circuit at the moment and I’m losing around half a second in the second section alone, which is clearly not good enough. We have to work on that and generally improve the speed through the corner in all the other sections it’s not carrying enough pace and no matter what I tried it just wasn’t happening today. We know we’ve still got a lot of work to do but that’s what we’re here for and I’m looking forward to tomorrow.” DAVIDE BRIVIO CAMEL YAMAHA TEAM DIRECTOR “Clearly we still have plenty of work to do tomorrow because we are not where we want to be on the first day. We need to improve the pace of both riders, who are struggling with different kinds of problems. As always they are working together for the good of the team and the engineers will use their feedback to try and come up with some better settings tomorrow. This is a very particular track because it is so tight and twisty, unlike any other circuit in the world, so we have to look for something particular with the setting. That is not as easy as it sounds but we will keep going!” More, from a press release issued by Fortuna Honda: FASTEST TIME FOR MARCO MELANDRI AT THE SACHSENRING Toni ElÃas returns after an enforced absence of three weeks The tenth round of the World Championship could not have started in better fashion for FORTUNA HONDA rider Marco Melandri as the Italian took provisional pole at the German Grand Prix. Marco, (who has already won before at the Sachsenring in 1999 in the 125s and 2001 and 2002 in the 250 class), performed superbly throughout the day. His best time of 1’23.145 bettered the circuit’s lap record by some six tenths of a seconds – the previous mark having been set by Sete Gibernau in 2005. Despite the fracture to his right shoulder blade, the Italian was a model of consistency on his Honda RC211V. Following his fall at Assen, which saw him miss two races, Melandri’s team-mate Toni Elias made his return to the track. The Spaniard is still suffering from pain and the difficult tenth corner at the Sachsenring really tested the physical condition of the brave Spaniard who ended the day in 15th position. MARCO MELANDRI (1st, 1’23″145): “We have been working from the set-up which helped me get on the podium at Donington Park. We have made a few small technical changes which have helped improve the bike’s performance. I am satisfied as I have felt good on the bike right from the start. Michelin have done a good job and today I tried a few compounds which were well suited to the German circuit. I like the Sachsenring a lot, it’s very enjoyable. Today was the best result of the season in the first qualifying session for me.” TONI ELIAS (15th, 1’24″626): “I am happy to be riding again after an enforced three week absence at home. It’s been a very difficult period for me as the fracture is very painful, although I have to remember how well the recuperation has gone as just one week ago I could not lift my arm. I am now at about 50 or 60 percent of my normal fitness, but the important thing is getting back on the bike. Because of the pain I could not complete too many laps, in the morning I did 15 whilst in the afternoon 25. Considering my physical condition I think I can be happy with my first day’s work. The first day with my new technician has been very productive.” More, from a press release issued by Dorna Communications: MELANDRI PROVES FITNESS WITH FASTEST PRACTICE TIME Despite still suffering from a fractured collarbone and other injuries after his huge crash at the race at Catalunya, Marco Melandri was today’s fastest MotoGP rider at the betandwin.com Motorrad Grand Prix Deutshcland with a best time of 1’23.145, breaking the circuit record by more than half a second. The Italian youngster pipped last week’s race winner Dani Pedrosa to the top spot by three tenths of a second on the final lap. All riders set their best time in the second of the two free practice sessions, with MotoGP’s single qualifying session coming at the Sachsenring circuit tomorrow afternoon, when grid positions will be decided. Third fastest on the day was Loris Capirossi, part of a top six who all ran under circuit record pace . Joining him were the American trio of Nicky Hayden, Kenny Roberts Jr and John Hopkins. Valentino Rossi and Casey Stoner were the other riders to lap under 1’24, whilst the returning Sete Gibernau and Japan’s Makoto Tamada completed the top ten. The second practice session saw a hard fall for Frenchman Randy de Puniet, a run off track by World Champion Valentino Rossi and a crash from Ducati rider Jose Luis Cardoso. All riders suffered no lasting damage, and with Toni Elias and Sete Gibernau back on the track after their respective lay-offs, it was good news for the medical centre. 250cc Jorge Lorenzo was again the fastest rider in the 250cc class today, putting himself on provisional pole after clocking a 1’25.124 lap of the Sachsenring Circuit. The Spaniard had an entertaining tussle with team-mate Hector Barbera for the top spot in Germany, edging him out by 36 thousandths of a second. Alex de Angelis was third, more than half a second off the pair, ahead of Yuki Takahashi, Shuhei Aoyama and Marco Simoncelli. Seventh place went to Roberto Locatelli, ahead of Anthony West, Hiroshi Aoyama and World Championship leader Andrea Dovizioso. The Kiefer BOS Racing team used the occasion of their home Grand Prix to announce the contract renewal of rider Dirk Heidolf’s contract. 125cc Mattia Pasini is on provisional pole for Sunday’s 125cc race at Sachsenring, heading the timesheets after a 1’27.546 lap. The Italian was ahead of Lukas Pesek by just over a tenth of a second with Mika Kallio and Pablo Nieto completing the provisional front row. Alvaro Bautista, fastest in this morning’s session, could only manage sixth, behind Simone Corsi and ahead of Sergio Gadea, Fabrizio Lai, Gabor Talmacsi and Joan Olive. MotoGP 1st, Marco Melandri (Honda), 1’23.145 : “I’m pretty happy, my shoulder is getting better all the time, and this track is good for it because we mainly go left and I don’t push the right shoulder so much. I like the track and we have a good base after Donington, so everything is going well.” More, from a press release issued by Team Suzuki: Promising first day for Hopkins in Germany Rizla Suzuki MotoGP racer John Hopkins was pleased with his first day’s work at the betandwin.com Motorrad GP Deutschland as he set about erasing last year’s memories by posting some fast times today. Hopkins (P6, 1’23.693, 48 laps) suffered a massive crash at Sachsenring last year and was determined to put it firmly behind him and attack the technical German track with his usual vigour. He topped the leaderboard a number of times during the rain interrupted morning session and was constantly in touch with the fastest times throughout the afternoon. The hard charging Anglo-American is confident he can improve on things tomorrow and is looking forward to Sunday’s race with high hopes. Chris Vermeulen (1’25.293) was again visiting a track he has never seen before and the rookie Australian showed his determination to learn the twisty and technical circuit by completing the most laps in the morning session. Vermeulen continued his learning process in the afternoon and ended the day with the 17th quickest time and the second highest number of laps under his belt by recording a total of 55. Today’s practice was held in overcast conditions and a small rainstorm before this morning’s session cost some valuable track time. The fastest time was set by Marco Melandri. Rizla Suzuki MotoGP has another free practice session tomorrow morning and that is followed by qualifying in the afternoon. Round 10 of the MotoGP World Championship gets underway at 12.30hrs local time (10.30hrs GMT) on Sunday 16th July. John Hopkins: “It’s been a good day for us. I haven’t had much luck here in the past and previous machines that we’ve had here have not made the track much fun. The new Suzuki and the improved Bridgestones have really made the track come together for me. I am learning my lines and working on getting the best tyre solution for Sunday. It will be a tough day tomorrow as we have got to get through a lot of laps to make sure we have the best tyre and to make more improvements. I am looking forward to it and hopefully we will get a good qualifying position tomorrow and I think we will be ready come race day.” Chris Vermeulen: “Again another new track and again the weather wasn’t kind to us early on with a bit of rain. That meant a little less track time. I quite enjoy the circuit and I did as many laps as I could today. We changed the bike setting and Bridgestone brought a lot of new tyres – we think we have found one that is heading in the right direction. For me it was about learning the track and hopefully I’ll get a good night’s sleep and go quite a bit quicker tomorrow.” Paul Denning Team Manager: “It’s been a relatively successful day at Sachsenring for Rizla Suzuki. The 2006 version of the GSV-R is, as we expected, a far more competitive proposition for this type of track. John’s previous experiences here haven’t affected his work-rate today and his very competitive showing. We still have some things to find to try and improve the bike’s performance. Fingers crossed those improvements, and more improvements that John recognises can come from him, will see us move forward another step tomorrow. “Chris has spent the day learning the circuit and has done a sensible job of getting a lot of miles under his belt. It’s a very difficult and technical track and quite hard to go quick on straight away, especially with so many blind corners and elevation changes. I think Chris was a bit frustrated at the end of the day but I’m sure he’ll be able to approach the track with a bit more experience tomorrow and take a big step forward.”
