Nine time World Champion Valentino Rossi (Movistar Yamaha MotoGP) was suffering from a bad headache for much of the useful tracktime as 2017 got underway in Sepang, but the Italian still posted a time that saw him end the day P8 on the timesheets and just over a second off the front. Work focused on evaluating and comparing data from testing in November to set a schedule for the continuation on Tuesday and Wednesday, with overall impressions positive.
Valentino Rossi, P8: “The first feeling wasn‘t so bad, because in this session we finally have the ’real‘ two bikes that we will use during the championship and they are better than the first prototype that we tested in November, from many points of view. Unfortunately, it was a difficult day today. This morning I woke up with a very bad headache and until 12 o‘clock I wasn‘t in good shape. After that we were able to do some laps and the feeling was good. In the afternoon we had to finish the work but it started to rain, so we have to wait and hope that in the next two days we will have good track conditions. We will try some new things tomorrow. Today we worked on the engine and the electronics and found some good stuff.”