AndreaModa wrote:Just shows how similar the two classes are now. It would never have been sustainable but if MotoGP had stuck to two strokes, at least that would have differentiated the two a bit, plus we'd still have that beautiful smell of two stroke fumes at the races! Now WSB is under Dorna though I suspect we'll see some changes to strip them of the electronics and take them back to more conventional road bikes, which is what it should always have been about.
True.
I would argue there's a number of other things at play - Hayden is still riding injured and has no motivation to get hurt again, for example. It's still a shocker, mind - a bit like Audi and Toyota turning up to a Ferrari test at Silverstone, slapping some qualifiers on their Le Mans machines, and going faster than Massa*. It would bring down the house.
Meanwhile,
Hayden has gone faster than the WSBKs yesterday.
Nicky Hayden lowered his lap time by almost one-second during day two of private testing at Jerez, putting the Ducati rider under this week's best WSBK lap in the process.
The American, the only factory Ducati MotoGP rider on track with team-mate Andrea Dovizioso still struggling with a neck strain, improved from a 1m 40.855s on Wednesday to a 1m 40.090s on Thursday, despite a small fall.
That beat the 1m 40.185s by Aprilia WSBK star Eugene Laverty, set with qualifying tyre on Wednesday. Laverty and Kawasaki's Tom Sykes both set a 1m 40.4s with race tyres. The Jerez MotoGP race lap record is a 1m 39.731s.
Still, nothing to write home about.
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*I know the differences are bigger in cars.