MotoGP 2005 - Round 3

Kawasaki riders, Shinya Nakano and Olivier Jacque, finished the first day of free practice in the build-up to Sunday’s Chinese Grand Prix in 12th and 15th positions respectively.

The race will be the first-ever road race GP to be staged in China, with the all-new Shanghai International Circuit providing space-age facilities for this historic MotoGP event.

However, the combination of unpredictable weather and the delayed arrival of the medical helicopter proved to be a frustrating mix, as the riders and team engineers tried to understand the all-new 5.4 km circuit.

The morning free practice session was delayed by two and half hours awaiting the helicopter arrival. This meant that the second session did not start until 4pm, two hours later than usual.

By this time rain had hit the Shanghai circuit, which had been dry and humid in the morning when no bikes could take to the track.

All the fast times were posted in session one, with times in the mainly damp but drying second session up to 15 seconds slower. A narrow dry line appeared late in the session, although there were still patches of wet track.

After spending session one learning the track and checking set-up on his Ninja ZX-RR, Nakano spent the second free practice session trying to second-guess the track conditions without success.

Temporary teammate Jacque, subbing for the injured Alex Hofmann, made an impressive debut on his first official day of competition aboard the four-stroke, 990cc Ninja ZX-RR.

Initially shocked by the impressive power and performance of Kawasaki's MotoGP machine in wet conditions the experienced Frenchman, winner of the 250cc world title in 2000, quickly justified the decision by team management to engage his services.

Shinya Nakano: #56 - Twelfth - (2’03.687) - "That was a difficult afternoon session in the conditions; starting wet and then drying out. I tried a cut slick on the rear too early in the session, the track was not dry enough, and that was a mistake. I then switched back to rain tyres, but the track was too dry, so it was difficult to evaluate tyre performance. The surface grip feels okay, although I am still lacking some confidence in the slow corners, but I think the correct tyre choice is the answer to that problem. The surface and some corners remind me of the Sepang circuit in Malaysia."

Olivier Jacque: #19 - Fifteenth - (2’05.165) - "That was a very scary comeback to MotoGP for me. It is so long since I have raced and I am not used to this amount of power in rain! Also this is my first GP on Bridgestone tyres and I am still adapting to them. But overall the bike is feeling very good, the team have given me an excellent set-up and the track has good grip, even in the rain, and this has helped build my confidence. I’m keen to move forward from here."

Ichiro Yoda: Technical Director - "Tyre performance has been difficult to understand in these conditions and normally as the track dries out lap times reduce. The rain specification front tyre was very stable, but at the moment the rear tyre is the limiting factor for us. Tomorrow we will try some different specification tyres, which Bridgestone have brought to China, as we try to gather more data on our first visit to this track. We had no technical problems today."

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