Both Ducati Team riders had a good run in today’s two further sessions of free practice held at the Losail International Circuit in Qatar. Andrea Iannone ended up third overall in the combined standings, just 170/1000ths away from provisional leader Marquez, while Andrea Dovizioso was classified in sixth place, 222/1000ths away from the top.
The overall standings see the entire field pretty close together, with a total of 18 riders covered by less than one second and eight riders separated by less than three-tenths.
Andrea Iannone set his quickest time (1’54.992) on the third lap of today’s second session, the Italian using the hardest compound rear tyre at his disposal (the medium). The man from Vasto then took to the track for the first time ever with side fairings with winglets and continued to lap at a good pace, but he then crashed at Turn 2 on his thirteenth lap, fortunately without any consequences.
Andrea Dovizioso exclusively went out on track today with the winglet version of his Desmosedici GP15 and he set his best time (1’55.044) on his fifteenth lap, after fitting a ‘soft’ rear tyre. Dovi had in any case set some positive times throughout the session, using the medium compound rear tyre option.
Andrea Iannone (Ducati Team #29) – 1’54.992 (3rd)
“I am satisfied with this second day of testing because in the end we again managed to find the feeling we had in the tests, and we were pretty quick both over one lap and over race pace. It’s a pity about the crash, I came into the turn and the front suddenly closed up on me. We were trying some different settings and I crashed, but luckily I didn’t hurt myself. To avoid crashes here at Losail, they should remove Turn 2 because we always crash at that point! In any case, on the medium tyre we are all pretty much together, while I only tried the soft tyre at the end of FP2, but conditions were not perfect, and so I don’t know how much advantage it will give. In any case in my opinion, from first to fifth place on the same tyre we are all very close.”
Andrea Dovizioso (Ducati Team #04) – 1’55.044 (6th)
“I am very pleased with the work that we’ve been doing these days, and we succeeded in testing a lot of things, some of which were positive. I don’t yet have a perfect feeling with my GP15, but despite this I managed to lap in 1’55.6 with the used tyre and I think that is a very good pace. However we have to improve because we’re still lacking a bit of stability when braking and this is quite important in view of the race, but we do have the speed and tomorrow we’ve still got a fourth free practice session to work on fine-tuning the bike. My lap on the soft tyre wasn’t perfect but it was important to remain in the top 10, and try out the grip on this tyre in view of tomorrow’s qualifying session.”
