Movistar Yamaha’s Maverick Vinales ended the first day of testing at the Phillip Island circuit fourth on the time sheets, and felt happy with his long-run pace.
The 2013 Moto3 world champion was in superior form when testing got under way in Malaysia at the start of the month, and was once again sending a letter of intent to the rest of the grid in Australia.
The Spaniard, much like he did in Malaysia, spent the day evaluating both versions of the chassis and fairing Yamaha has brought with them. Once again, he remained tight-lipped over the new parts.
Alongside testing various parts, Vinales focussed his efforts on long-run pace. Finding a strong set-up on his M1 to work with, he was left feeling extremely pleased with his race runs.
“About today, I think we can be happy in one are,” he said. “On the race pace and basic set-up we made a good step, I feel comfortable.”
Vinales completed 64 laps of the Australian circuit today and was fourth fastest at the chequered flag, setting a best time of 1m29.990s early in the session to go fourth.
With still plenty of time before the season-opening Qatar Grand Prix, the Spaniard thought it best to carry on with his race simulations and opted against a flying lap at the end of the day.
“We didn’t set a fast lap at the end of the session; in the last 10 minutes we went back to the box,” Vinales explained. “We still have time until Qatar to be fast and try to improve the bike, and I think our objective here is to be consistent and really fast.”
Team-mate Valentino Rossi also put the new parts through their paces today, completing a total of 77 laps. Initially struggling to push his Yamaha, the Italian grew more comfortable on the bike in the latter part of the day and put in a 1m29.684s in the closing minutes of the session to go second.
Rossi hopes to improve his long-run pace over the next two days, but ends Wednesday pleased overall with how things went.
“It was a good day, I‘m quite satisfied. We started in a difficult way this morning. Before the break I wasn‘t strong enough and because I couldn‘t push at the maximum I didn‘t have a lot of feeling,” he said.
“We worked well during the break and in the afternoon the situation changed, I was a bit better. At the end, with the new tyre, I was able to do a good lap and second position is positive for the first day. For sure, we still have a lot to do, especially on the long distance and we hope to have good weather also in the next few days.”
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