Thursday Nov 29 2007
Test Jerez - Spain - Day 3

Today at Jerez the Ducati Marlboro Team completed the final day of the last test session of 2007. Casey Stoner, who injured his left shoulder when he fell yesterday, was unable to ride today and instead flew home to Australia. Marco Melandri did ride and worked hard throughout the day to further improve his feeling with his Desmosedici.

The Italian doesn't yet feel fully at ease on the machine but believes he has given his engineers some feedback that will enable them to make the bike feel more suitable for him when testing resumes in late January.



Marco Melandri, 1m 41.619s (68 laps)

"Once again, we didn't spare ourselves today - we worked very hard until quite late. Anyway, so far I haven't found my best riding position, so I don't feel enough at ease to use the bike to its maximum potential. We made a lot of changes to the settings but when we made the bike behave better into the corner, it got worse on the exit, and vice versa. That's why we didn't do so many tyre tests, because I couldn't get the right kind of feedback. I nevertheless think I have given my technicians some useful information which will help me to feel more in tune with the bike when we start again in January."

Today's lap times
1. Pedrosa (Honda) 1m 38.562
2. Hayden (Honda) 1m 38.848
3. Lorenzo (Yamaha) 1m 39.464
4. Dovizioso (Honda) 1m 39.747
5. Nakano (Honda) 1m 40.121
6. Edwards (Yamaha) 1m 40.184
7. De Angelis (Honda) 1m 40.185
8. Toseland (Yamaha) 1m 40.213
9. De Puniet (Honda) 1m 40.398
10. Hopkins (Kawasaki) 1m 40.984
11. Rossi (Yamaha) 1m 41.538
12. Melandri (Ducati Marlboro Team) 1m 41.619
13. Okada (Honda) 1m 41.715
14. Canepa (Ducati) 1m 41.793
15. West (Kawasaki) 1m 42.343
16. Guareschi (Ducati) 1m 42.850
17. Ito (Ducati) 1m 43.001