By Sports Reporte/Valencia
QMMF Racing Team riders Anthony West and Juli?n Sim?n completed the first pre-season test for this year’s Moto2 world championship in Valencia, Spain, with strong lap times and valuable set-up conclusions. With new WP suspension systems, both riders had the right feeling for the latest version of the Speed Up prototype straight away and clocked 12th and 13th fastest on the first day of testing.
When rain set in for the second and third day, the 33-year-old Australian and his 27-year-old Spanish team-mate continued their work despite cold and treacherous conditions, establishing a solid set-up base for possible wet races to come. Sim?n was as high up as third and West as high up as eighth in some of the wet sessions, confirming the team’s high potential for the 2015 season.
“It was a bit strange to get on the bike after a couple of months, but I feel okay because I did a lot of riding in Australia and I did two Superbike races in Qatar,” said West who finished 12th with a time of 1.36, 017.
“The Moto2 bike is quite different, but I am happy with what we achieved in a short time. We were here for the first time with the new suspension and I was immediately up to speed, even though it was were very cold and I felt stiff and a little bit sick coming straight from Australia with temperatures of 30 degrees.
“I need another week or so to adjust to the weather. Despite the difficult conditions, I was matching my best times on this circuit consistently. On day two I tried to improve and to put a few fast laps in, but then the weather turned bad. We started with a dry setting and when it got wet, the spring was obviously too hard, so I came in and we changed to another shock with a softer spring, but there still was a problem.
“We fixed our issues for the third day of testing and I went faster immediately. But it turned out that we need a specific rain setting with this suspension, which we still have to learn. Even though the conditions were cold and difficult, it was good to realize this and it will help us in the future when we have to race in the rain. It was not a nice day, but we learned something!”
Juli?n Sim?n, who ws 13th in 1.36,130, was also pleased.
“I am very happy about my return to the race track after a long winter without any racing motorcycles. On the first day, my goal was to get into the swing again with the Speed-Up and to adapt myself to this bike as much as possible,” he said.
“I managed to put a fast lap in, which made me happy, but the most important thing was that I had a good feeling with the bike straight away. It’s only the second time for the team with WP suspension, so we started off trying a lot of different suspension set-ups in order to learn and to establish a good base “On day two, we tried to build on that, but rainy weather set in and made it impossible to improve.
I still went out in wet conditions in order to get some experience and some data with the new suspension, which was very positive. The bike is good in these conditions, with good grip and good feedback from the tyres. But I am not at the limit yet, because this bike feels more rigid than the one I had last year and I am still trying to understand how hard you can push and open the throttle.”
The next three-day test will take place at Jerez, Spain, next week.
Anthony West and Simon in action during testing at Valencia for the 2015 motorcycling season.
