Team HRC sets to work at a wet Donington

“It was a tricky day due to the weather conditions and I felt a little strange on the bike after last weekend’s MotoGP stint. It took me a few laps to adapt to the Superbike again this morning, and I also felt we needed to make an adjustment in terms of the bike’s balance. So even though we ran a solid FP1 in terms of lap times, we planned to make some setup changes for FP2. Unfortunately, though, we didn’t end up riding in the afternoon due to the rain, and so the work we had planned for that session is postponed until tomorrow. With any luck the weather will be better and we’ll be able to make the most of the final free practice as we prepare for Superpole and race 1.”

“There’s not much to say about day one because conditions were mixed all day. Already in FP1 the rain started to fall after just two or three laps and so I didn’t want to push too much or cause the temperature of the rear tyre to drop. So I was unable to complete a constructive session despite really positive initial feeling, in that the confidence was there straight away. In FP2 it was already raining on lap one but not enough to make for a full wet session, so basically the session was not useful at all. The new asphalt seems great but, having said that, we’ll have work to do tomorrow in FP3 because we need to understand how to manage the tyre life on this new surface, so tomorrow morning will be crucial in order to prepare for race 1.”