Andrea Dovizioso seeks rear stability from Yamaha

Andrea Dovizioso made a solid rather than spectacular Yamaha 1000cc debut in Valencia this week after he ended the first test for 2012 with the fifth quickest time.

The Italian clocked a best time of 1.33.256 on his Monster Yamaha Tech 3 debut to finish just over 0.7s behind new team-mate Cal Crutchlow.

The former Repsol Honda rider, who finished third in this year’s world championship, told MCN he was impressed with braking stability and corner entry on the YZR-M1.

But he said Yamaha will need to significantly improve stability under acceleration after the two-day session was dominated by Honda duo Dani Pedrosa and Casey Stoner.

The former 125GP world champion told MCN: “Yamaha has really good stability on the brakes and really good entry but I struggle a lot on the exit. There is too much movement and I lose a lot of acceleration. It was very important to understand the point where Yamaha has to improve and we had a really good meeting with all the Yamaha engineers. It was especially good to analyse how the 1000cc bike works. The difference between the 800cc and the 1000cc is very small because the chassis is very similar. The character of the engine is the same, you just have more torque power as it is a 1000cc.”

Dovizioso was frequently swamped by Yamaha engineering staff in technical debriefs as they tapped into his experience, with 2010 MotoGP world champion Jorge Lorenzo absent from the test with injury.

The Spaniard’s serious left hand injury sustained in a warm-up crash at Phillip Island last month hadn’t recovered in time for him to ride and Dovizioso added: “I had a lot of input in the development of the bike because Lorenzo was not here. I have a lot of experience with Honda and I am third in the championship and I think they understand that I can give them a lot of important feedback.”