Okay, I will go out on a limb here. That Casey Stoner that seemed invincible last year while on his way to his first MotoGP championship is back. It is no secret that Ducati has struggled with set-up of its MotoGP bike this year, and that Stoner has lost some of the confidence he had last year when he rode like a “god” on occasion, according to Valentino Rossi. The bike has been coming around, of late, and Stoner claims some breakthroughs were made in recent testing. His times during the opening practice sessions for this weekend’s MotoGP event at Donington Park indicate he is telling the truth.
Stoner was fastest all day long, and not by a small margin. At the end of the day, he was nearly 6/10ths of a second quicker than the next man, Honda’s Nicky Hayden (who will race the pneumatic valve bike this weekend for the first time).
