Jordi Torres & Nico Terol sign off at Jerez on a positive note

The Moto3 World Championship looms ever larger, with the majority of riders now two thirds of the way through their preseaosn testing programme following the conclusion of a three-day session in Jerez.

With six days down there are just three more scheduled for Jerez in March before the season gets underway in Qatar, although Terol, Torres, Rabat and Kallio will head to Australia for a three-day session with Dunlop in the meantime. After a battle between Tito Rabat and Tom Luthi for leadership of this test, Mika Kallio popped up at the end of the day with a time of 1’42.169 to leave the session on top.

Despite the day being hit by morning fog and lower track temperatures than yesterday, this was the fastest lap of the test.

MAPFRE Aspar’s two riders looked tired but happy at the end of a third day of relentless riding at Jerez, where they have built up a stack of data to help the team prepare their machines as properly as possible for the start of the new campaign.

Despite not managing to propel themselves towards the top end of the timesheets with a flying lap both Nico Terol and Jordi Torres steadily increased their pace and rhythm until the moment the track closed at 6pm, racking up 60 and 62 laps respectively. The Spanish pair head off to Australia next week in a positive frame of mind.

15th Nico Terol 1.43.245 (60 laps):
“I am happier today because I feel like I have got the feeling for my bike back. I got a bit lost with the front fork but we found our way yesterday and today we were able to confirm that, stepping up the rhythm and consistency even though we didn’t set a particularly fast lap. We can leave Jerez feeling happy. The lap times at the top are really impressive but that often tends to happen in testing, the important thing is to be ready for the first race. We are on the right path and this has been a positive test for us because we have rebuilt our confidence with the bike. I’d like to be a bit higher up the order but it’s only a matter of time.”

22nd Jordi Torres 1.43.537 (62 laps):
“We tried some different configurations with the front fork today to try and find a bit more stability in corner entry. We also made some changes to the rear to improve grip and get the bike turning better at full lean. The feedback was good and the majority of things we tried were positive but we still need to take another step forward, especially in terms of letting the bike run off the brakes. The lap time is not as good as the guys at the top but we are not panicking about that, the goal here was to establish a good base to work from without worrying about the lap time. In any case, our pace has been better here at Jerez than last year.”

Source: Aspar Media