The first two free practice sessions for Sunday’s Grand Prix of Catalunya took place today in fine weather conditions at the Montmelò circuit on the outskirts of Barcelona.
Andrea Dovizioso and Andrea Iannone ended the day in fourth and sixth place respectively, but both Ducati Team riders will still need to do a lot of work tomorrow in order to find an ideal set-up that will help them improve their feeling with the Desmosedici GP15 on the Catalan track.
Andrea Dovizioso (Ducati Team #04) – 1’41.823 (4th)
“Today was a bit of a strange day: the feeling I had with my GP15 was rather unusual and so we will have to check through the data to see what we need to modify on the bike. The track doesn’t have much grip and there are also a lot of dips created by the cars, which cause us a lot of bother. We’ve still got all day tomorrow to work on things, so we’ll have a look at the data calmly before deciding the right direction to take to improve.”
Andrea Iannone (Ducati Team #29) – 1’41.938 (6th)
“Today went differently to how I expected it to go: I didn’t think I’d struggle so much and thought I’d be quick right out of the box. Instead it was difficult for me to get into the right rhythm. For the moment I don’t have the feeling I want: probably the bike’s behaviour won’t change very much on this track over the weekend, but I am sure that we will find a way to be quicker and in any case today we’ve already improved the bike in the braking points. I’m not particularly worried because I’m working well with the team and I’m sure we will find the right direction tomorrow.”
