After a rookie year in MotoGP where Marco Bezzecchi (Mooney VR46 Racing Team) ultimately proved to be a very solid teammate for Luca marini, he continues with the same consistency during pre-season testing.
3rd on the evening of the Valencia test, 0,230 seconds behind his leader, the native of Rimini climbed to the top of the rankings for the first day of testing on the Sepang International Circuit thanks to a time of 1'58.470 achieved in the last minutes of the session, after having suffered a small, minor fall in the morning.
« It was a good day (laughs)! It was a great emotion because it's always good to jump on the bike and feel that incredible speed the first time: you never get used to that feeling, especially on the first of every year! Personally, this is the second time I've experienced this cool MotoGP moment, and today it was fantastic. I really like motorcycling, but it's nothing new: the sensations were already good in Valencia. At the beginning, unfortunately, I suffered a small fall because I made a mistake. It was something I could have avoided, but in the end it wasn't anything crazy. I'm happy, we're off to a good start, but it's only the first day. The bike has a lot of strong points, like the old one after all, but there are some steps down in the positive details like corner entry and braking. I still lack a little confidence with the rear end, especially when braking, because I think this bike has a lot of potential compared to last year's bike, but I'm not yet using its strengths of the best manners. On the timed lap, I immediately felt comfortable as we have to work hard on the pace of the race. We don't have enough tires, and I drove a lot with the Medium which is not the racing tire here. So we suffered all day but when I put the soft on it was really much better, and just by changing the tire the bike was fantastic. »
A new fall the next day, faster and with more material consequences, did not prevent Marco Bezzecchi to maintain leadership in the combined ranking, despite a best time of 1'59.361 and a modest 12th place for the day.
« Despite the fall, we had a good day. I stayed on the track for a long time on used tires and also kept a good pace throughout the race. Too bad about the fall, I stayed in the garage for a while because it was important to get back on the track with the same bike. In the wet then, I can't complain, I felt comfortable. Compared to the GP21, I have more downforce at the rear and that helps me a lot. »
Finally, this time without a crash, the man who has 3 victories in Moto3 and 3 victories in Moto2 managed to improve his reference by almost a whole second, in 1'58.363, but fell to 8th place in the combined test ranking, 0,474 from his leading teammate.
“I am really happy with all the work we were able to do during these three days. Yesterday the rain changed our plans a bit, but today we were able to try a lot of things on the bike. I have gathered important and meaningful information, and I am happy. I found a good base of settings and then I just made a few modifications to understand the sensations that were coming from the bike and that I could also exploit on other tracks. I didn't do the simulation, it was planned, but in the end we preferred to avoid it. »
The Bezzecchi scorpion remains calm but could well sting this year…
Ranking of MotoGP Test results at Sepang J3:
Combined ranking of the MotoGP Test at Sepang J1/J2/J3:
Credit rankings: MotoGP.com
