Danilo Petrucci | Photo credits: Roadracing World
The third and final day of the official Sepang test that MotoGP riders used to prepare for the 2019 season, ended with no less than four Ducati bikes on the four top spots of the timesheets. On this last day, the Italian bikes outperformed everyone else, and it was eventually Danilo Petrucci, new factory Ducati rider on the Mission Winnow Ducati team, who claimed the fastest time of the day.
Petrucci, using the new front fairing that Ducati brought to Sepang to try on the Desmosedici GP19, set the best lap of the test with a 1m58.239s, leaving the second spot for MotoGP rookie and Moto2 champion Francesco Bagnaia. The Italian young talent of the Alma Pramac Ducati team, showed that he won’t be using his first season in MotoGP to watch the veteran riders fight for top positions while he stays at the back.
Francesco Bagnaia was just 0.063s slower than Petrucci, and that shows how the rookie is facing the new challenge in MotoGP. Behind him, his teammate Jack Miller also continued the work and pace shown yesterday, with the third fastest time, while Andrea Dovizioso had to settle with the fourth fastest lap of the final day on the Sepang test.
As for Hafizh Syahrin, the Red Bull KTM Tech3 rider asked yesterday for the team to work and try to find new strategies that allow him to push harder on corner exits, and that desire seems to have been fulfilled today, with Syahrin being able to lap 1,1 seconds faster that his best time until today.
The Malaysian rider ends the Sepang test on a high note, but he and the Red Bull KTM Tech3 team will need to find solutions for the problems with the rear tyre that Syahrin has voiced already during pre-season tests.
As for new aerodynamic fairings, Yamaha and Ducati were the only manufacturers to show what they’ve been developing over the Winter break. At this third day of the Sepang test, both the Monster Energy Yamaha team and the Mission Winnow Ducati used new fairings, with new winglets. Aprilia and KTM had already shown what they have new for the 2019 season on the tests done before, so now it’s just a case to see what Honda and Suzuki have prepared for their bikes.
Michelin also had a new tyre for MotoGP. The French tyre manufacturer developed a new front and a new rear tyre, with two different compounds and a special mixing technique. These tyres seem to have pleased the riders who tested them, but Michelin won’t know if they’ll be used this season until the final test is done in Qatar.
For now, riders and teams will enjoy a small break before they return to action on the second official test of the season a few days before the Qatar race, the start of the season, on March 10.
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