Scott Redding declared himself happy with progress during the opening night of testing at the Losail International Circuit in Qatar, after closing to within 0.3s of the fastest open class Honda rider, Nicky Hayden.

Hayden is an important benchmark for Redding, as the former MotoGP World Champion is campaigning an almost identical Honda RCV1000R to the 21-year-old Briton this season, but has far more experience in the premier class.

Today was Scott’s first experience of the Losail circuit aboard the Honda RCV1000R, but with the base set up from Sepang also working well in Qatar, the MotoGP rookie was able to concentrate on refining the front-end set up of the bike, setting a personal best of 1’57.922 to end the opening day tenth on the timesheet.


Scott Redding // 1’57.922 // 38 Laps

“It was good to get out on the Honda RCV1000R on a new track today, in very different conditions to the heat and humidity we had to contend with in Malaysia. Overall I’m pretty happy with today’s test, although I was starting to push the front a lot as my pace increased. We need to find a bit more edge grip from the front tomorrow. Engine power is still not really good, but it’s on a par with the other open class Hondas and I’m happy to have closed the gap to Nicky Hayden today. The brakes worked well from the first exit, so I’m happy with them. Tomorrow we will focus on improving the feeling with the front, and we will try to close a little more on Nicky.”

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