Pedrosa fastest in morning before second practice postponed‏

Round 14: Aragon GP – Free Practice One

Dani Pedrosa led the way in the morning’s 45-minute free practice session at Motorland Aragon, setting his best lap on his last of the session to go almost half a second clear of Jorge Lorenzo who was second fastest. Third quickest this morning was last year’s Aragon GP winner and championship leader Casey Stoner.

• Motorland Aragon, Friday 16 September 2011
• Bridgestone slick compounds available: Front: Soft, Medium, Ex Hard. Rear: Soft, Medium

Conditions for the session were dry and the temperature, although cooler in the morning in this region of Spain, was still high. The track was still a little dirty, but Pedrosa’s best effort was just 0.7seconds off the lap record after only the first session of the weekend.

Normally the afternoon session is faster as the track has cleaned more with all the extra running and the tarmac temperature has increased, but today’s second MotoGP session was postponed after a power-cut at a nearby power station left most of the paddock without electricity.

Consequently, MotoGP free practice will resume tomorrow at the earlier time of 0935hrs local time and will be extended to an hour and a quarter. The afternoon’s qualifying schedule remains unchanged.

Masao Azuma – Chief Field Engineer, Bridgestone Motorsport

“This afternoon was obviously quite frustrating for the teams and riders as the postponement of the second MotoGP practice session interrupted their planned work and made it difficult to make their tyre choices. Despite the best efforts of those involved, power at the nearby station could not be reinstated so there was no option but to postpone. From this morning’s session it was difficult to draw concrete conclusions as the track was still a little dirty and sandy so we don’t get a clear picture of what to expect for the rest of the weekend. During the session some riders didn’t use both options of front and rear slicks, but under the regulations the riders had to select their split of front and rear tyre compounds today which was quite a tricky task without much data, so we worked very closely with them on this to provide as much data as possible to help their decision. Practice resumes tomorrow morning, when riders will have an extended session to make up for some of the time lost today so it will be a busy day.”

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