He may have been quick yesterday, but today he was something else: fastest time of the day for Andrea Iannone on day two of testing at Losail, artificially illuminated just as it will be for the first GP of the season.
The Suzuki rider leads the way, powering his GSX-RR to the top of the timesheets: “we started well yesterday and I immediately had good feeling with the bike. Today we've continued to work well and I was able to set some really fast lap times. I'm really pleased with how things are going for me and the Suzuki team. Tomorrow we'll try some new things, to check behaviour and to improve a little more”.
Are you particularly strong at this track or is the Suzuki better than ever?
“i really like the track, I'm i shape and the bike is giving me confident but it's the complete package that determines the final result, as it always does”.
While Iannone is “on fire”, Alex Rins is also getting on very well. The Catalan rider's fifth fastest time is just four tenths off that of his team-mate: “it was a great day because although we didn't test many things on the bike, we were able to focus on race pace, which was good. We made some small changes to the suspension, and those worked well”.
What does it mean for the Suzuki team to be so competitive?
“Tomorrow I'd like to try a race simulation to really understand our level. Andrea is going good, he set a really fast time today. We're all working hard, us riders, the team... the bike is very competitive, some new parts have arrived from Japan and they're excellent. We want to try and fight for important results this season”.