Fiat Yamaha's Jorge Lorenzo started his weeked off right in the Czech Republic with the fastest lap in Friday's free practice.
In the Czech Republic it was none other than Fiat Yamaha’s Jorge Lorenzo setting the fastest pace in Friday’s free practice session at the Brno circuit. The current championship leader dominated by more than half a second ahead of Repsol Honda’s Dani Pedrosa and Yamaha teammate, Valentino Rossi, at the start of Round 10 of the MotoGP series.
"I am happy to be riding here in Brno again," said Lorenzo. "It's always difficult to go back to work after the holidays and this track is so different to Laguna, so wide and much longer; it took me a few more laps than usual to get going! Once I found my rhythm this was a good session and I felt happy on my bike, with a good setting to start from. We tried both rear tires and we need more time to choose, because unfortunately it rained a bit at the end and we had to stop early. We'll have to wait and see how the track is tomorrow but we hope for it to be dry so we can continue with what we started on today."
Rossi was just 0.065 seconds off Pedrosa’s pace and looked in better condition after having two weeks off to rest.
"I'm happy, this was a good practice and I feel good on the bike." Rossi said. "After some laps I started to feel some pain in the shoulder and the leg but in general I am okay and my condition has improved a lot from the last race."
Valentino Rossi felt some pain during the session but overall had a successful practice.
Coming in fourth in the books with a time that was 0.541 seconds off Lorenzo’s pace was Honda’s Andrea Dovizioso, who set a fastest lap of 1'57.873 to become the final rider to reach below the 1’58 mark. Following the Honda man was Ducati rider Nicky Hayden, who secured the fifth-quickest time of the day after setting a pace which was more than a second adrift of Lorenzo’s time.
“It was certainly nice to be back in the saddle today and the bike felt quite good out of the gate," said Hayden. "The two weeks away gave me time to think about some things and the team too, and together we were able to come up with some ideas that seemed to have worked."
Monster Yamaha Tech 3's Colin Edwards outran his teammate, Ben Spies, earning the sixth-fastest lap of the day with 1'58.497. Casey Stoner of Ducati took a lap out on the Brno circuit that was good enough for seventh, with San Carlo Honda’s Marco Simoncelli completing a lap that was a full 1.625 seconds adrift of Lorenzo’s pace. Monster Yamaha Tech 3’s Ben Spies and Rizla Suzuki’s Alvaro Bautista rounded out the top-10 times in ninth and tenth respectively.
“It is good to get back to work after a short holiday and the first practice was not too bad for us," Bautista said. "I started with the hard rear tire and I didn’t feel like I had much grip and it felt like I lost traction a few times. We are working to improve this problem and in the last 15 minutes of the session we were going to test the softer tire, but it started to rain so I couldn’t compare the different tires."
LCR Honda’s Randy de Puniet, returning to action from his broken leg, was well off the pace in 16th, almost three seconds behind the pace of Lorenzo.
2010 MotoGP Brno Practice Results:
1. Jorge Lorenzo (Yamaha) 1'57.215
2. Dani Pedrosa (Honda) 1'57.756
3. Valentino Rossi (Yamaha) 1'57.821
Repsol Honda's Dani Pedrosa took second on the timesheets at Brno behind Lorenzo by more than half a second.
4. Andrea Dovizioso (Honda) 1'57.873
5. Nicky Hayden (Ducati) 1'58.286
6. Colin Edwards (Yamaha) 1'58.497
7. Casey Stoner (Ducati) 1'58.532
8. Marco Simoncelli (Honda) 1'58.840
9. Ben Spies (Yamaha) 1'58.970
10. Alvaro Bautista (Suzuki) 1'59.204
11. Loris Capirossi (Suzuki) 1'59.216
12. Aleix Espargaro (Ducati) 1'59.254
13. Mika Kallio (Ducati) 1'59.289
14. Marco Melandri (Honda) 1'59.510
15. Hector Barbera (Ducati) 1'59.910
16. Randy de Puniet (Honda) 2'00.184
17. Alex de Angelis (Honda) 2'01.098
Moto2
G22 Holiday Gym’s Fonsi Nieto took the leading time in Friday’s free practice session for the Moto2 division. With a lap of 2'04.875 completed near the end of the session, Fonsi secured the leading time by just two-thousandths of a second ahead of home rider Karel Abraham and Technomag-CIP’s Shoya Tomizawa.
Abraham had the leading time during the first half of the session, but a crash at Turn 13 put an early end to his day, and with 25 minutes left Nieto was able to sneak past his time on his 18th lap out.
Tomizawa also suffered a crash early on but managed to get back on his bike and post the third-fastest lap of the hour ahead of Fimmco Speed Up’s Gabor Talmacsi. Mapfre Aspar’s Julian Simon took fifth in the timesheets after being 0.157 seconds adrift of Nieto’s pace.
2010 Moto2 Brno Practice Results:
1. Fonsi Nieto (Moriwaki) 2'04.875
2. Karel Abraham (FTR) 2'04.877
Andrea Iannone had the eighth-fastest time and was more than four-tenths off Nieto's pace.
3. Shoya Tomizawa (Suter) 2'04.907
4. Gabor Talmacsi (Speed Up 2)'05.010
5. Julian Simon (Suter) 2'05.032
6. Yuki Takahashi (Tech 3) 2'05.039
7. Simone Corsi (Motobi 2)'05.216
8. Andrea Iannone (Speed Up 2)'05.300
9. Alex Debon (FTR) 2'05.329
10. Arne Tode (Suter) 2'05.338
11. Roberto Rolfo (Suter) 2'05.491
12. Stefan Bradl (Suter) 2'05.548
13. Sergio Gadea (Pons Kalex) 2'05.591
14. Alex Baldolini (I.C.P.) 2'05.735
15. Thomas Luthi (Moriwaki) 2'05.741
16. Mike di Meglio (Suter) 2'05.943
17. Jules Cluzel (Suter) 2'05.948
