Valencia Free Practice Rider Quotes

Day one at Valencia has come to a close and we've had two practice sessions, the combined times from which being topped by title protagonist Jorge Lorenzo. The Movistar Yamaha rider guided his YZR-M1 to a best lap of 1:31.111 during the afternoon session, run under beautiful sunshine.

The Spaniard, along with team-mate Valentino Rossi and Repsol Honda's Marc Marquez, has been at the centre of controversy over the last week following the Malaysian Grand Prix. Most notable of which was the Spaniard's attempt to intervene in Rossi's CAS appeal case, which angered his team.

Rossi had his request for a stay of execution on his grid penalty denied on Thursday, and thus will start the title-deciding final Grand Prix of 2015 from the back of the grid. The meant the Italian's Friday was spent focused fully on race set-up. His pace suggests that he is looking strong, but still needs to find something extra to get on terms with Lorenzo.

Honda ended the day forcing Yamaha to look over their shoulder after Marquez ended the day second on the combined times with his FP1 fastest lap of 1:31.250. Dani Pedrosa, the winner of two out of the last three races, was second quickest in FP2 and just three tenths shy of the fastest time. Front-end issues hindered the duo, something that will need to be resolved tomorrow to put them into a position to win Sunday's thirty-lap Grand Prix and spoil Yamaha's party.

Elsewhere, Andrea Iannone and Danilo Petrucci impressed on the Ducati's, whilst Scott Redding endured his most miserable day as a MotoGP rider on the unwieldy Satellite RC213V Honda.

So lets take a look at what some of the riders had to say about their day's work.

Jorge Lorenzo, Movistar Yamaha MotoGP:

“The day started positively and we improved the bike a lot in the afternoon. The bike is working really well and I feel strong, with good concentration. I'm riding well, but the bike, to be honest, is working very well for me to keep a high pace, even with old tyres, so I'm very happy about the beginning of the weekend.”

Valentino Rossi, Movistar Yamaha MotoGP:

“When I'm riding I'm more relaxed and I'm quite happy about these two first practice sessions, because already this morning my pace was not so bad and I was also quite competitive with the used tyre, which is very important for the race. I'm also happy that in the afternoon we tried something different that made me increase my rhythm and improve my lap times. I used the hard tyres and it wasn't so bad and after I tried the soft to make a comparison and make the right choice for Sunday. It's true that we have to decide our strategy now, because I think it will be difficult to use the fifteen minutes of qualifying like a free practice, so I think maybe I can do the normal procedure anyway.”

Marc Marquez, Repsol Honda Team:

“I'm happy because I went out on track and got back to enjoying myself riding; it was important and something I was really looking forward to doing. It's been a positive day because we did a good job with set-up of the bike. In the second session we worked hard with Sunday's race in mind, riding with used tyres and also testing the hardest compound. We are pretty clear about how we can continue to improve tomorrow, because the track temperature increased a lot and if it stays like this, we will have to concentrate on the durability of the tyres.”

Dani Pedrosa, Repsol Honda Team:

“Even though we finished third for the day, it's not been a great start to the GP. My first feeling when I went out on track this morning was that we needed a bit more grip with the rear. We spent most of the day working on the issue and we must continue to work on the bike set-up tomorrow to solve this small problem and to be faster for qualifying. I'm not sure how the race will play out at the moment, I'm just focusing on improving for tomorrow.”

Cal Crutchlow, LCR Honda:

“Overall I'm happy enough, we used the hard rear tyre for a long time in the afternoon session and it was not so quick, but I was working a lot on the set-up. Then we put in the soft tyre and we managed to get in a really nice lap time, even though I found a couple of guys on the track on my fast lap, so I'm positive going into tomorrow. I'm happy enough with how the session has gone, but although it's the last round we have to treat it like any normal race weekend and do our very best for myself and the team. Everybody likes to finish the year on a good note and I did last year with a fifth place here and I hope to try and do the same again.”

Andrea Iannone, Ducati Team:

“In the end it was a good day, but to be honest I expected to struggle less and be a bit closer to the leaders. In any case I am quite satisfied because the weekend has just begun and we managed to improve from this morning by only making a few small modifications, which were beneficial. We go closer to the front and so we will continue in this direction to gain some more tenths, in order to be ready for Sunday.”

Bradley Smith, Monster Yamaha Tech 3:

“Today was not great in terms of the end result, but I am fully confident that we can progress more tomorrow and get back to where we should be. Throughout the day, we improved gradually and made some small steps forward but we wanted to be as ready as possible for the GP and so we did a lot of laps on the rear tyre in order to get a good race set-up. Anyway, we started to find a good direction in FP2 and I am sure that we will be much more competitive with new tyres when we get going again tomorrow. The main area where we have to improve is sector four which is the part of the track that I am struggling with and which also prevented me from setting a stronger lap time. Yet, I am convinced that the team will work hard tonight and we will surely be back inside the top ten tomorrow morning.”

Scott Redding, EG 0,0 Marc VDS Honda:

“Today was the most difficult day I've had on the bike. It just felt like the bike wasn't working for me and I spent all my time fighting with it rather than riding it. It was spinning and pumping at the rear and the front felt like it was going to close all the time, more so on the softer option tyre, which should have been better. I couldn't put two laps together because of having to fight the bike in every corner and when I pushed harder I was making mistakes and running wide. We tried a few things but they didn't give an improvement. We need to look for a solution tonight, maybe the electronics can help us, but we need to find something.”

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