Valentino Rossi: I’m not very happy

Valentino Rossi has said that he is not happy after the first evening of testing in the final preseason test in Qatar.

The Doctor struggled in the last test in Australia and didn’t find the opening evening in Qatar any easier. Waiting until the floodlights took over fully, he got through 48 laps with a best time of a 1:55.679 which was 0.860 off the fastest lap time set by Dovizioso, which was good enough for seventh place overall.

Working on weight distribution and improving the feeling on the front end of his YZR-M1, Rossi said that they improved over the night, but he was still not happy with the overall evening’s work.

“Today we worked on the feeling of the bike especially on the entry of the corner,” said the nine-times World Champion.

“We improved, but I’m not very happy. We are not at 100%, because I didn’t have enough feeling to push on the entry, but today wasn’t so bad and we tried something quite interesting.”

As well as weight distribution and front end feeling, Rossi also noted how he was having issues with tyre life.

“We also had a bit of trouble with the front tyre life, the tyre is a bit too soft, so we have to work on the weight distribution,” he says.

“The condition of the track usually changes a lot here in Qatar, so we will try to continue our work tomorrow and try to make things better.”

Photo via Movistar Yamaha