MotoGP test day 2 at Cheste, with Márquez’s debut

MotoGP test day 2 at Cheste, with Márquez's debut

The MotoGP World Championship enjoyed a slightly better day than yesterday, although in complicated conditions due to rain and cold at the Cheste Circuit, but working to the maximum. Among them, we were able to see the great debut of Marc Márquez with the Honda.

By GloriaUpdated 3 December 2012 · Published 14 November 2012 · 3 min read

The MotoGP World Championship held its second official pre-season test day today at the Cheste Circuit, where we were finally able to see the great debut of rider Marc Márquez with his Honda RC213V in conditions somewhat similar to last weekend and these past few days, so most of the riders decided not to go out much in the morning session.

During the morning, the hardest-working rider was Aleix Espargaró, the CRT World Champion who worked a lot on his ART, also in complicated conditions. Bradley Smith, who was making his MotoGP debut, Nicky Hayden, Dovi and several other riders who were gradually getting encouraged also went out on track.

But the Repsol Honda garage remained closed, until finally around midday, at 15:00h, one of the most anticipated moments of this MotoGP test at Cheste occurred, the debut of Marc Márquez with the RC213V, and on that first lap he was accompanied by his teammate Dani Pedrosa, who showed him the track for the MotoGP and let him follow his wheel.

The 93’s progress after his first lap was brutal: lap after lap he lowered an average of two tenths, finally closing the test with a positive time, so a very interesting evolution. Although the fastest rider of this test was the 26, Pedrosa showed himself to be confident, strong and eager to get out on the track, setting a time of 1:32.322 on one of his last laps of the 30 he completed.

Behind him was Cal Crutchlow, 0.349s away, while 2012 rookie Stefan Bradl was 3rd, almost half a second behind, followed by Hayden 4th, Bautista 5th, Dovi 6th, Márquez 7th in his debut and 1.081s behind Pedrosa. The rest of the day’s positions were 8th for Pirro, 9th Iannone, 10th De Puniet, 11th Smith, 12th Abraham, 13th Petrucci, 14th Barberá and 15th Espargaró. The rider who completed the most laps was Andrea Iannone with 56 laps on his debut with the Pramac Ducati.

Meanwhile, at Motorland Aragón, where the Yamaha team moved yesterday after seeing rain ruin day 1 of training, they were unable to work, as the rain and poor conditions didn’t allow much. Furthermore, Jorge Lorenzo suffered a small crash, without consequences fortunately, and his test was over; Rossi wasn’t very keen on it either.

A lot of interest.