Ducati's Valentino Rossi has found some much-needed corner exit speed from his Desmosedici GP12 after some setup tweaks at the Motegi MotoGP round stopped the preponderance of wheelspin he has been suffering.
The Doctor finished fifth on the timesheet in second free practice and will spend tomorrow's final session working out which of the tyre compounds to use as their performance is very similar.
“Today went pretty well, especially in the afternoon because we made a setup change that helped us to improve grip on acceleration. When I open the gas I’m able to exit the turns better, without spinning too much, and that’s why I went pretty fast. I’m especially happy because the gap isn’t too big," said Rossi.
"Tomorrow, though, we’ll have to improve our pace as well, because for now I’m able to ride well for some laps, and then the tyre starts to slide a bit too much. The rear-tyre choice will be very important because the performance of the soft and the hard are very similar. The soft works a little better but we have to understand if it can last the race distance. Tomorrow we’ll try some more changes and then we’ll also consider the temperature for Sunday when making a decision.”
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