BMW Motorrad Motorsport - WSBK - Imola - Infront Testing
Infront testing – Imola.
2nd April 2012.
Imola, 2nd April 2012. The sporting aspects were secondary at
today’s official Infront testing at Imola (ITA). The day was
overshadowed by a crash for the Spanish rider Joan Lascorz, who
suffered a severe back injury. He was air-lifted to the Maggiore
Hospital at Bologna for further tests. The whole Team BMW Motorrad
Motorsport wishes him all the best.
The BMW Motorrad factory team used the test to work in several areas. Factory riders, Leon Haslam (GBR) and Marco Melandri (ITA), were both able to make further progress. The conditions were good. The sun was shining and it was warmer than yesterday, with air temperatures around 20 degrees Celsius and track temperatures around 25 degrees Celsius.
Leon Haslam:
Best overall lap time: 1:47.257 min (2nd session)
Leon started the day evaluating new tyre compounds provided by Pirelli for this test. The Italian manufacturer brought one new tyre for the front and three new compounds for the rear to Imola. In the morning, Leon and his crew were also testing some adjustments to the rear end of his BMW S 1000 RR. In the afternoon, Leon worked on the electronics set-up and continued to evaluate the new tyres.
Leon:
“First of all, I want to send all my best wishes to Joan and his family. It is always horrible, when severe accidents happen. Regarding my test I was pretty happy. We got through all the test items we wanted to get through and also gathered some information. We tried the new tyres and we had a few different things strategy wise to test. The times were as quick as yesterday, and on medium tyres we were even faster so I am quite happy. It was good to do a test after the race and just finalise a few things.”
Marco Melandri:
Best overall lap time: 1:47.779 min (1st
session)
Marco and his crew successfully worked on the
chattering he was struggling with. They found a solution that helped
to reduce this issue. Marco then focused on the balance of his RR and
tested different suspension settings that brought improvements,
enabling Marco to consistently ride lap times of 1:48.0 minutes on
race tyres.
Marco:
“It is very sad what happened to Joan. I wish him good luck and hope that everything is going to be well. Regarding the sporting aspects, I am really happy because I think it has been my best test day since I have been with BMW Motorrad. For the first time, we got some answers today and I am very happy about that. We mainly used the same tyre specification we had in the race to understand how much we have improved compared to yesterday and the team did a very good job. I hope that the base settings of our bike will work well on a track like Assen. I don’t know yet if we were able to 100 percent fix the chatter, but we are sure that we have improved it. I can only be positive.”
Andrea Dosoli (Head of Race Operations):
“First of all we wish all the best to Joan. It is always sad when a rider and a friend of ours gets seriously hurt. To talk about the test day: In general it is very productive to test on the same track on the Monday after the race because you can focus on the issues you were facing during the race weekend in the same conditions. We think we have found a solution for Marco’s issues, at least on this circuit, but we are confident that it will also work in Assen and on other race tracks. Apart from this, Marco and his crew have been working on different suspension balances and the rear end setting which allowed him to keep a quite fast pace on the hardest tyre. Leon spent part of the morning session and the afternoon testing the new tyres brought by Pirelli, finding good solutions that could be useful in the future. Also the job he and his crew did on electronic strategies has been positive.”
