Hayden reviews a testing Catalunya weekend

Nicky Hayden had a “hard weekend” at Montmeló which ended with eighth place on Sunday, as the American and his Ducati Team worked through a number of options during the weekend in an attempt to prepare for the race.

“Most of the weekend was hard for us, any time we found any rear grip we pushed the front and if we weren’t pushing the front we were just spinning,” he said. “We tried a lot of options and the team worked really hard, we tried some stuff and maybe we tried too much, but I thought we had it sorted out a bit in the warm-up. That was on used tyres though and in the race when we put in a new rear tyre at the beginning for the first ten laps I was just in the way.”

As the race developed Hayden’s feeling became better, but he became embroiled in a battle with Marco Melandri which meant that the distance to the riders ahead of the pair became too great for the Ducati man to make up further positions.

“As the tyre went off the balance got better and I was able to push, I recovered a couple of positions and I actually thought I might be able to get up to Bautista in fifth and was setting a pretty decent rhythm, but then at the end once I got to Melandri I had a hard time getting past him and had a battle, and the guys in front took off again. So I’m not happy about being eighth by any means,” stated Hayden, who is now looking to the following rounds to push on.

“Now we just try to learn from it and get ready for Sachsenring and Laguna Seca, two tracks I really like. I’m fourth in the Championship which at this point in the season isn’t too bad, but I need to step my game up or I’m not going to stay there long!” he added.