2006 MotoGP Championship - Round 15 - Motegi, Japan - September 22/23/24

Suzuki Day 1 Report

Rizla Suzuki MotoGP made a steady start to the A-Style Grand Prix of Japan, with all three riders getting through a lot of positive work in readiness for Sunday’s race.

John Hopkins (P8, 1’47.915, 49 laps) was the quickest rider on the circuit during the morning session and found a dry setting that worked well. This enabled him to spend the afternoon’s hour long session to try many other settings on his Rizla Suzuki GSV-R to find additional performance. Hopkins and his crew learnt many things in the session and now have a clear direction for Sunday.

Chris Vermeulen (P17, 1’49.488, 49 laps) is at Motegi for the first time and spent both sessions learning the Japanese track. He improved on his times dramatically over the day and is well placed to take huge steps tomorrow in the final free practice session and qualifying.

Suzuki Wild-Card rider Kousuke Akiyoshi (P14,1’48.317, 34 laps) is competing in his first ever Grand Prix and made an impressive start to the weekend, and his fastest time was ahead of many experienced MotoGP riders. He is convinced that he can go quicker over the weekend and is determined to get in amongst the points on Sunday.

Today’s free practice sessions were held in dry and cloudy conditions with temperatures reaching 25°C. The quickest time was set by reigning World Champion Valentino Rossi.

Rizla Suzuki MotoGP has one more free practice session on Saturday morning followed by the all-important afternoon qualifying hour to decide grid positions for Sunday’s 24 lap race that gets underway at 14.00hrs local time (05.00hrs GMT).

John Hopkins:
“This afternoon we went through a lot of settings and tried a lot of stuff. We tried many things to look for a good race set-up but basically it was one of those sessions where everything we tried didn’t help us go quick, but gave us important information. This meant we could never get into a really good rhythm, but we know we can do the lap times as this morning’s position showed. The Suzuki and the Bridgestone tyres are working excellently around here on this track. The position this afternoon is not really a true one, but in the dry we are ready and I think we can definitely have a good race here.”

Chris Vermeulen:
“This is my first time at Motegi and it is a really good racetrack – I’m certainly enjoying it. There is a lot of grip here from the Bridgestone tyres and from this morning to this afternoon I made quite a big step. The biggest thing today has been learning the circuit, we made a few changes and tried some tyres but the main thing was finding my lines around here. I learnt a lot today and we have now got enough information to hopefully make the bike and me better tomorrow.”

Kousuke Akiyoshi:
“I am really pleased to be here in my first Grand Prix at Motegi. I have worked hard with my team and we are quite happy with how today has gone, but we also think that we can do better tomorrow and we will be trying to do so.”

Paul Denning – Team Manager:
“A good steady day with no dramas and the whole team got through a lot of work. Rizla Suzuki and its three riders are very positive about the opportunities over the next few days in Motegi. John’s lap time this afternoon on race tyres wasn’t as good as this morning, but he got through a mountain of work and cleared a lot of things up direction wise – he is confident he can go quicker when he needs to!

“Chris has stuck to his task of learning the track as quickly as possible. He has none of the experience of his competitors here and I’m sure with a night’s sleep he will come back tomorrow and attack the track with a lot more confidence.

“It’s great to see three Suzuki GSV-Rs out on the track and Akiyoshi san looks like he is having a lot of fun, and he certainly doesn’t look out of his depth in his first ever GP. I am sure he will be riding very hard over the weekend and giving some regular riders a hard time!”