To absolutely no-one's surprise, Repsol Honda's Casey Stoner has topped the MotoGP timesheet during day one of official testing at Jerez, edging out title rival Jorge Lorenzo by a quarter of a second but it was disaster for Valentino Rossi who is nearly 1.8s off the pace.
Stoner shot into first place as the track temperature began to cool down after the session had been mostly dominated by Lorenzo and factory Yamaha team-mate Ben Spies but Rossi, who did 64 laps and was half a second slower than team-mate Nicky Hayden, clearly has a mountain to climb over the next two days and is struggling with front-end grip on corner entry.
Today has been quite good, we did race distance with a soft set tyres this morning and we were getting quicker and quicker as we progressed but I think also the circuit was getting better. Then we put the hard tyre on and did a tyre comparison and we had very similar feelings to what we had in Sepang," said the world champion.
"We tried a few things with the chassis as the bike was proving slow to turn in the corner but in general it is working well especially at the end of the tyre life. On the last exit we did our fastest lap on a new soft rear tyre. It's been a good first day."
Lorenzo's circuit best lap of 1'38.189 wasn't troubled on the first day but Stoner is only four tenths off his own pole lap from last season, posting a 1'39.146 compared to Lorenzo's 1'39.419. Dani Pedrosa, in third, is not far behind on a 1'37.579 but then there is another four tenths back to Spies in fourth.
Monster Yamaha's Cal Crutchlow is the first of the satellite bikes in fifth place and just less than a second behind Stoner at this stage with Hayden and Alvaro Bautista behind him. Ill birthday boy Andrea Dovizioso is eighth, one place ahead of Rossi, with Stefan Bradl rounding out the top ten on his LCR Honda.
Randy De Puniet has confounded critics of the CRT formula by posting a lap of 1'41.015 to take 11th spot. The customer Aprilia bike lapped only a tenth slower's than Rossi's works Ducati and the Aspar man is clearly the quickest of the CRT men staying ahead of two satellite Ducati prototypes ridden by Hector Barbera and Karel Abraham.
Aleix Espargaro, on an identical ART bike, was second on the CRT sheet with a 1'42.293, just ahead of Forward NGM's Colin Edwards. Britain's James Ellison was 21st but is still getting used to carbon brakes and the new-spec Bridgestone tyres.
Jerez MotoGP test day one - conditions dry
1 Casey STONER Repsol Honda Team 1:39.146 - - 54
2 Jorge LORENZO Yamaha Factory Racing 1:39.419 +0.273 +0.273 76
3 Dani PEDROSA Repsol Honda Team 1:39.579 +0.160 +0.433 60
4 Ben SPIES Yamaha Factory Racing 1:39.984 +0.405 +0.838 71
5 Cal CRUTCHLOW Monster Yamaha Tech 3 1:40.130 +0.146 +0.984 74
6 Nicky HAYDEN Ducati Team 1:40.512 +0.382 +1.366 77
7 Alvaro BAUTISTA San Carlo Honda Gresini 1:40.545 +0.033 +1.399 56
8 Andrea DOVIZIOSO Monster Yamaha Tech 3 1:40.665 +0.120 +1.519 46
9 Valentino ROSSI Ducati Team 1:40.920 +0.255 +1.774 64
10 Stefan BRADL LCR Honda 1:40.983 +0.063 +1.837 64
11 Randy DE PUNIET Power Electronics Aspar 1:41.015 +0.032 +1.869 39
12 Hector BARBERA Pramac Racing Team 1:41.388 +0.373 +2.242 72
13 Karel ABRAHAM Cardion AB Motoracing 1:41.603 +0.215 +2.457 71
14 Aleix ESPARGARO Power Electronics Aspar 1:42.293 +0.690 +3.147 59
15 Franco BATTAINI Ducati Team 1:42.403 +0.110 +3.257 72
16 Colin EDWARDS NGM Mobile Forward Racing 1:42.462 +0.059 +3.316 56
17 Michele PIRRO San Carlo Honda Gresini 1:42.655 +0.193 +3.509 49
18 Danilo PETRUCCI Came Iodaracing Project 1:42.750 +0.095 +3.604 39
19 Mattia PASINI Speed Master 1:43.006 +0.256 +3.860 59
20 Yonny HERNANDEZ Avintia Racing MotoGP 1:43.437 +0.431 +4.291 49
21 James ELLISON Paul Bird Motorsport 1:43.477 +0.040 +4.331 61
22 Ivan SILVA Avintia Racing MotoGP 1:44.025 +0.548 +4.879 60
