After a shaky start to proceedings, Aruba.it Ducati’s Chaz Davies was left feeling encouraged by the pace of his Panigale R on fresh and worn rubber after topping the second practice session in Imola.
Davies comes into this weekend’s Italian round in need of a repeat of his double heroics from 12 months ago, after the Welshman slipped 84 points behind championship leader Jonathan Rea following a non-finish and a third at Assen.
Not particularly happy with his feeling on the Ducati in FP1, in which he finished well over two tenths down on Rea in second, a few set-up tweaks ahead of the afternoon’s session allowed Davies to post consistently quick laps.
“I am pretty happy, I think I surprised myself a bit with the lap time a little bit,” he said.
“This morning we weren’t too comfortable out there, but we changed a few things in terms of tyres and set-up, which allowed us to make a good step forward. We set a good lap time, faster than last year’s record.”
Davies posted a best effort of 1m46.229s, which put him just under half a second clear of the race record and only seven tenths down on his outright lap record from last year’s Superpole session.
However, what was more noteworthy for him was the fact he was able to consistently lap close to his fastest time in the session on used rubber, though he does admit that the bike still needs to be further improved in a few areas.
“The most important thing is our pace on used tyres, which is really close to our best lap, even though we still have a couple of areas to improve.
“To race here in Italy, so close to Ducati’s headquarters, is special. Our supporters give us extra motivation to do well.”
Team-mate Marco Melandri was almost a second down on Davies’ lap time at the end of practice, but the fourth-placed Italian was nonetheless satisfied with his day’s effort.
Admitting that he is ‘still missing something’ coming into the corners, Melandri feels he has made a better start to the weekend than he did last time out at Assen and is confident of being able to challenge for the podium in tomorrow’s first race.
“It’s been a positive day for us,” he said.
“I found myself at ease right away on a track that is always difficult to interpret, and the team did a great job. On our part, we have to keep working because we still miss something under braking and corner entry.
“But we made a good step in the right direction compared with Assen, and I’m confident ahead of the race. We’ll go at least for the podium.”
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