Nine-times World Champion Valentino Rossi described his opening day in Brno as a difficult one, with the Italian ending the MotoGP free practice sessions seventh fastest overall.
The Factory Yamaha rider struggled with the unusually high track temperatures and subsequently what the heat is doing to the rear tyre on his M1.
“For sure it was a difficult day, the conditions are at the limit with more than 50 degrees on the asphalt. It’s difficult to manage,” said the Italian.
“It’s also difficult to ride the bike at the maximum because it looks like the track have quite a lot of bump, like a little worse compared to last year. So it’s not easy.
“I do not have a fantastic feeling, especially in the front. We still have to work. But for me the main issue, the biggest problem will be the rear tyre degradation.
“Here the rear tyre drops a lot. After three or four laps you lose a lot of grip and you have a lot of spin so it’s difficult to keep the right pace. So we have to work a lot on this point, in this area. It looks like the situation is not very clear still because a lot of top riders try different tyre options front and rear. I don’t try the harder option but a lot of riders like it.
“Tomorrow I will try. Maybe tomorrow we can understand in a better way our level.”
As much as Rossi is suffering with his rear tyre in the Czech heat, ‘the Doctor’ believes that he won’t be the only one to struggle with the rear tyre.
“I think everybody suffer,” he said. “It depends who suffer less. When you put the new tyre you have two laps where you are fast and it’s very easy to improve the lap time.
“But for 21 laps I think the key for arrive on the podium is to try and suffer as less as possible. The rear degradation is a lot, so you lose a lot of performance, you lose a lot of time. The track is also long so the gap become bigger.”