Kawasaki's competition manager, Michael Bartholemy, declared himself
satisfied with the progress made by the team's four riders, as the season
opening three day test at Sepang was brought to a successful conclusion this
afternoon.
After two days evaluating new chassis and engine components, John Hopkins and
Anthony West were able to focus this morning on fine-tuning the base set-up of
their Ninja ZX-RR machines, before embarking on a race simulation as the heat,
and the track temperatures, headed skywards during the afternoon.
While the two race pilots racked up the laps, test rider Tamaki Serizawa
brought the paddock to a standstill when he debuted a screamer version of
Kawasaki's Ninja ZX-RR.
The distinctive high-pitched scream of the development bike was enough to
bring a crowd of people out of their pit boxes and onto the pit wall as Serizawa
flashed across the start finish line to continue the bike's first shakedown
test.
Olivier Jacque gave the screamer motor its second outing during the afternoon
session, with positive results. Both test riders will continue the evaluation of
the bike during the second Sepang test in early February.
Hopkins and West now head for the second test of the season, which will take
place at the Phillip Island circuit in Victoria, Australia, starting on 30th
January and concluding on 1st February.
John Hopkins:
"I'm happy with how things have gone, and I leave this test pretty
motivated for the next. Overall I'm really pleased with the bike; we have a
couple of small things to address, but we've now got a clear understanding of
what our goal is and where we need to be, and I think we're ready to make the
next step. I was pretty pleased with the first race simulation on the bike; the
traction control works really well, so I didn't have to adapt my riding style so
much to compensate for the drop off in grip as the tyres started to go off
towards the end. This is a big positive. Now I'm looking forward to getting to
Phillip Island. I followed Randy in the race there, and the Kawasaki looked to
be working well, now we need to take it to the next level. It's another new
track for me on the Kawasaki, and I hope the test in Australia will turn out to
be as positive as these last three days in Malaysia have been."
Anthony West:
"We tried a few more front tyres again today, working towards identifying
the ones that give me the most confidence in the front, and that we can continue
with during the next few tests. We also tried some different engine brake and
traction control settings, before running a race simulation this afternoon. The
idea of the endurance run was too give me a better feel for the bike when the
tyre performance has started to drop off. The only problem today was that the
track temperature was already quite high when we began, and that meant that the
grip had already started to fall off. It was a bit weird, because I actually
went faster towards the end, which we obviously weren't expecting. One positive
point is that the revised chassis components appear to have eliminated the
chatter that plagued us during the race here last season although, because of
the grip issues, we will need to confirm this at Phillip Island next week. It's
been a hard three days to be honest, because the heat and humidity really takes
it out of you. Things should be a lot better at Phillip Island next week,
although it was 40 degrees there when I was visiting my grandfather over
Christmas. Hopefully it's cooled down a bit now."
Michael Bartholemy:
“Overall I'm happy with the progress we've made during these three days
in Sepang. Both riders have had the chance to get back up to speed after the
long winter break, and John was quick to get to grips with the 2008 Ninja ZX-RR.
Despite the tricky track conditions that caught out more than a few of the
leading riders, John was consistently fast throughout the test and has provided
Kawasaki's engineers with both the necessary data and a clear direction for
their development efforts over the coming weeks. John has also set the target
for Anthony, who knows he has some work to do when we get to Phillip Island next
week. He didn't seem to settle as quickly as John, but his lap times improved
throughout the second and third day at the test, so I'm sure he'll be able to
close the gap significantly at his home circuit. We've covered a lot of ground
for the first test of the season, and the contribution of our two test riders
shouldn't be underestimated. Olivier Jacque and Tamaki Serizawa have completed
individual test schedules equal in intensity to that of our two race pilots, and
this will pay dividends for Kawasaki in terms of development. Now we must look
to carry this momentum on to Phillip Island, where we'll be looking for both
riders to finish higher up the timesheet."
from Kawasaki Racing press
