Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP |News details:Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP Conclude Sepang Test with Full-On Day 3

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Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP wrapped up the first official IRTA test of the 2023 season today at the Sepang International Circuit in Malaysia. Fabio Quartararo and Franco Morbidelli ended the outing with an intense final day of testing. They finished 17th and 20th respectively in the overall standings.

Sepang (Malaysia), 12th February 2023

Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP Team’s Fabio Quartararo and Franco Morbidelli put in loads of effort on the third and final day of the Sepang MotoGP Official Test. It was all hands on deck today to make up for lost time on Day 2 due to rainy conditions. The third consecutive eight-hour practice session was crucial to collect some final data in preparation for the 2023 season. They ultimately took 17th and 20th place respectively in the overall test results.

Quartararo showed his typical determination and dedication today. He completed 63 laps in total on Day 3, more than any other rider, in an effort to gather as much data as possible on the final testing day in Sepang. His best time, a 1’58.943s, set on lap 48 put him in 19th position in today’s timesheets, 1.054s from first. His faster Day-2 time, a 1’58.897s, saw him finish the test in 17th place overall, 1.008s from the top.

Similar to his teammate, Morbidelli used the final day in Malaysia to work on completing his testing programme as much as possible to help the Yamaha engineers gain further insights about the updated items. His fastest lap was a 1’58.986s, set on lap 38/44, that had him end the day in 20th place in both the Day-3 rankings and the combined results, 1.097s off the fastest time.

The team will now return to Europe whilst the Yamaha engineers in Japan process the testing data. The Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP Team will regroup in Portugal from 11-12 March for the Portimão MotoGP Official Test.

Massimo Meregalli

Team Director

This test was very important for us. We had a lot of items to evaluate over the last three days. It was a shame that rain cut into our track time over the course of the Sepang Test. We worked as much as we could and gathered a good amount of data, but it has not been easy to evaluate all those items in a really short time. Fortunately, we could decide on the most important items that we needed to assess during this test. For other items, like some parts of the aero package and chassis, we were not able to decide on them here, and we will have to try them again in Portimão. We are happy with the improvement we have made in terms of top speed. But unfortunately we couldn't finish the entire testing plan. The list of items to test was so long, and the dry track time was so short, that we weren't able to get the job done entirely. We will now go over all the data that we couldn't analyse here to prepare for the last and very important test in Portimão in March.

Fabio Quartararo

Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP Rider

I'm very happy with the top speed. This is something I asked for for a long time. We had many things to try, and I'm happy about that too, because we asked for this as well. Overall, the pace on used tyres is good, I'm feeling super happy, but we need to improve on riding with new tyres. Today, the feeling wasn't great during the time attack. We will have a look at all the data and then have a think on how to ‘reset’ for Portimão. Let's see if we can make a big step.

Franco Morbidelli

Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP Rider

So, finally, we ran through the aero options. We really needed to do that, and we found some interesting stuff that we will need to confirm in Portimão. We back-to-backed some other things that we needed to test consecutively. Finally, we also did a time attack, but that wasn't so positive. So, we need to dig deeper on that side. We will work on that and arrive more prepared in Portimão.