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- Feb 25, 2007
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Bopper season starts early
Spies shows his class
Mon Feb 08 04:14PM
No matter how you slice it, 0.876s is quite a chunk of time when placed in the arena of MotoGP testing.
But to say you're going to take at least 0.5s off your best lap times before actually heading out to take the best part of a second off, that takes some balls.
Especially when you're the new boy.
You've no doubt seen the testing times from Sepang, where Vale finished the game on top of the timesheets and Stoner was 0.4 (virtually) off him while Jorge Lorenzo found his feet on the new M1 and managed to get to third quickest spot.
So pretty much what a lot of MotoGP watchers expected, but what really registered on the racing horizon was Ben Spies's performance.
OK, so it's a test and you can never be that sure about the times that come from it, but let's take a closer look at Spies's best time.
On day one he racked up 55 laps and was 1.7s off Rossi's best. At the end of the first day in the sweltering heat of Sepang, Spies's crew explained that their man had a bad dose of jet lag and was working his way through some parts for the M1. We looked at the times and waited to see what he would do on day two.
It's interesting to point out here that Spies is a methodical worker. He doesn't panic; he just works out what he needs and sets about doing the job he's there to do. He may have been jet-lagged to the other side of the world, he may have been trying new bits left, right and Thursday, but he was doing what he needed to do.
So on to day two and while Lorenzo bagged himself 60 laps (as did fourth fastest man Dani Pedrosa, the pair of them putting in the most amount of laps by some margin), Valentino was happy with 32 focussed efforts as he dialled in the Yamaha that little bit more (Rossi had already put in 54 laps on day one). Spies managed to bag his times in just 31 laps, the fewest of all the full-time riders taking part.
So what does that tell us about Spies in MotoGP so far? Well, he's finished the first serious' test of 2010 fifth fastest and has taken almost a second off his times from day one to day two (which points to that time not being some grin-and-go-for-it banzai attack lap, you don't gain that chunk of time by being reckless out there), he's confident enough in his bike to publicly say he can be better on day two, he's happy with what he's managed in the fewest amount of laps, and he's beaten his teammate who managed to end day two seventh.
That might sound like quite a huge result to anyone who hasn't been watching Spies over the past couple of years, but to us who are familiar with the Texan's method of attack it all smacks of the usual fast-and-cool work ethic which is only going to get better and better.
I'll bet that Rossi is taking a very much closer look at Spies than he did before the Sepang test.
I still think that Spies will be doing nothing short of the almost impossible if he wins a race this year in MotoGP, but I really do believe that a podium or two is within his grasp on that M1 before he graduates to the factory machines next year.
To use his homestead's vernacular: yee-hah.
Spies shows his class
Mon Feb 08 04:14PM
No matter how you slice it, 0.876s is quite a chunk of time when placed in the arena of MotoGP testing.
But to say you're going to take at least 0.5s off your best lap times before actually heading out to take the best part of a second off, that takes some balls.
Especially when you're the new boy.
You've no doubt seen the testing times from Sepang, where Vale finished the game on top of the timesheets and Stoner was 0.4 (virtually) off him while Jorge Lorenzo found his feet on the new M1 and managed to get to third quickest spot.
So pretty much what a lot of MotoGP watchers expected, but what really registered on the racing horizon was Ben Spies's performance.
OK, so it's a test and you can never be that sure about the times that come from it, but let's take a closer look at Spies's best time.
On day one he racked up 55 laps and was 1.7s off Rossi's best. At the end of the first day in the sweltering heat of Sepang, Spies's crew explained that their man had a bad dose of jet lag and was working his way through some parts for the M1. We looked at the times and waited to see what he would do on day two.
It's interesting to point out here that Spies is a methodical worker. He doesn't panic; he just works out what he needs and sets about doing the job he's there to do. He may have been jet-lagged to the other side of the world, he may have been trying new bits left, right and Thursday, but he was doing what he needed to do.
So on to day two and while Lorenzo bagged himself 60 laps (as did fourth fastest man Dani Pedrosa, the pair of them putting in the most amount of laps by some margin), Valentino was happy with 32 focussed efforts as he dialled in the Yamaha that little bit more (Rossi had already put in 54 laps on day one). Spies managed to bag his times in just 31 laps, the fewest of all the full-time riders taking part.
So what does that tell us about Spies in MotoGP so far? Well, he's finished the first serious' test of 2010 fifth fastest and has taken almost a second off his times from day one to day two (which points to that time not being some grin-and-go-for-it banzai attack lap, you don't gain that chunk of time by being reckless out there), he's confident enough in his bike to publicly say he can be better on day two, he's happy with what he's managed in the fewest amount of laps, and he's beaten his teammate who managed to end day two seventh.
That might sound like quite a huge result to anyone who hasn't been watching Spies over the past couple of years, but to us who are familiar with the Texan's method of attack it all smacks of the usual fast-and-cool work ethic which is only going to get better and better.
I'll bet that Rossi is taking a very much closer look at Spies than he did before the Sepang test.
I still think that Spies will be doing nothing short of the almost impossible if he wins a race this year in MotoGP, but I really do believe that a podium or two is within his grasp on that M1 before he graduates to the factory machines next year.
To use his homestead's vernacular: yee-hah.
