FIRST MOTOGP PRACTICE SESSION AT LOSAIL, DEVELOPMENT OF THE APRILIA RS-GP CONTINUES
Losail (Qatar), 26 March 2015 – For the Aprilia Racing Team Gresini the first night practice session on the Losail track in Qatar, which leads up to the 2015 MotoGP season opening Grand Prix, represented another step closer to the race that will mark their return to the top motorcycle sport category.
In today’s session the engineers from Noale once again continued the development path on the RS-GP bikes which began during the winter tests.
This is the spirit of the season, continuous development of materials, obviously very young, and technical solutions to become more competitive.
Neither Alvaro Bautista (22nd best time) and Marco Melandri (25th) missed an opportunity to take advantage of this session to test new solutions and setups.
Quite a bit of work was also done on the chassis, an area where the most margin for improvement had been noticed. For tomorrow there are plans to explore more radical solutions to make a comparison with the work done today. The purpose is still to build a strong technical base that will be developed throughout the championship season.
ROMANO ALBESIANO (Aprilia Racing Manager)
“For us every session on the track is another step forward, so the first Grand Prix practice sessions are no exception. During the last tests here in Qatar we dropped the engine brake levels very low, values that proved to be too low today. So tomorrow we’ll work on this and, with both Alvaro and Marco’s second bikes, we’ll work on some chassis solutions that are radically different than the base setup. The purpose of this is to explore every possible development direction.”
FAUSTO GRESINI (Team Manager)
“For us this isn’t much different than the tests we did just a couple weeks ago right here. Our riders continued to work hard, with Alvaro concentrating more on engine tests and Marco looking for the right feeling to make progress, focusing more on the various setups. Tomorrow we will have two practice sessions that we can use to continue in this direction, working hard to improve.”
ALVARO BAUTISTA
“On this first day of practice we focused our work on a few new engine parts, making a fairly important comparison between the two different solutions. At the moment there is not much difference, but I think that with a few more changes we’ll be able to take a big step forward, so I’m confident in the changes that Aprilia has in store for the future. Obviously in just 45 minutes today there wasn’t a lot of time to try and improve the situation compared to the recent test sessions here at Losail, just like there wasn’t much time to work on the bike on site. In any case, for this weekend our goal is still to achieve the best possible sensations in the saddle. We’ll look at the race as if it’s a long run, like it’s a test where we will be trying to maintain the most consistent pace we can.”
MARCO MELANDRI
“Basically the bike is the same as the one we used in the recent tests, so we clearly were not expecting any great revolution. We tried a few different setup solutions, but there is still a lot of work to do on both the bike and my feeling with it. Sure, we’ve still got a long way to go, but for us every session is a new test.”
