The teams converged at the Sepang International Circuit this week for three days of preseason testing. The time-sheets hold very few surprises. Marc Marquez led the first session and then reclaimed the top-spot on the final sheets after having yielded the lead to Jorge Lorenzo at the end of the 2nd day. The Honda package once again seems to be the machine to beat.
Looking at timings of the best-laps alone, there seems to be some bunching of the riders into groups of 2+5+4 and the rest. While almost all riders have improved on their best times session after session, three riders in particular have shown a significant drop in their lap times over the 3 day period, their final position notwithstanding.
Andrea Iannone, Maverick Viñales and Loris Baz would be pleased with where they were placed at the end of the third day relative to their first session. With his pace, The Maniac Joe (Andrea Iannone) has firmly placed himself between the leading duo of Hondas and the trailing pack of Yamahas. Maverick Viñales with his improvement is less than half a second behind his much experienced teammate Aleix Espargaro, while Loris Baz, with all his improvement is off of his teammate Stefan Bradl's pace by about 1.2 seconds. Just as qualifying performances and starting positions are only indicators of race day results and are by no means definite predictors, this ranking on the timing sheets with adequate number of caveats can be treated as a general indicator of what we can expect to see during the first few races. Let us though wait and see how the season might try to surprise us.
| Legend | Rider | Team |
|---|---|---|
| MM | MARQUEZ, Marc | Repsol Honda Team |
| DP | PEDROSA, Dani | Repsol Honda Team |
| AI | IANNONE, Andrea | Ducati Team |
| VR | ROSSI, Valentino | Movistar Yamaha MotoGP |
| JL | LORENZO, Jorge | Movistar Yamaha MotoGP |
| PE | ESPARGARO, Pol | Monster Yamaha Tech 3 |
| AD | DOVIZIOSO, Andrea | Ducati Team |
| SB | BRADL, Stefan | Forward Racing Team |
| BS | SMITH, Bradley | Monster Yamaha Tech 3 |
| AE | ESPARGARO, Aleix | Team Suzuki MotoGP |
| CC | CRUTCHLOW, Cal | CWM LCR Honda |
| MV | VIÑALES, Maverick | Team Suzuki MotoGP |
| DPC | PETRUCCI, Danilo | Pramac Racing |
| HA | AOYAMA, Hiroshi | HRC |
| HB | BARBERA, Hector | Avintia Racing |
| MP | PIRRO, Michele | Pramac Racing |
| SR | REDDING, Scott | Estrella Galicia 0.0 Marc VDS |
| NH | HAYDEN, Nicky | Drive M7 Aspar |
| LB | BAZ, Loris | Forward Racing Team |
| JM | MILLER, Jack | CWM LCR Honda |
| AB | BAUTISTA, Alvaro | Aprilia Racing Team Gresini |
| MD | DI MEGLIO, Mike | Avintia Racing |
| KA | ABRAHAM, Karel | AB Motoracing |
| EL | LAVERTY, Eugene | Drive M7 Aspar |
| KN | NAKASUGA, Katsuyuki | Yamaha Factory Test Team |
| TT | TAKAHASHI, Takumi | HRC |
| ALD | DE ANGELIS, Alex | Octo Ioda Racing Team |
| MML | MELANDRI, Marco | Aprilia Racing Team Gresini |
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