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Additional Michelin MotoGP Test In December

Posted 8 years ago by QuikrCars | 771 views

In preparation for the 2016 MotoGP championship, Michelin have scheduled an extra day of testing for their MotoGP tyres. The test would involve the testing of the newly developed front tyres by Michelin in cold conditions specifically. Michelin have announced 21st and 22nd December as the two testing days which will be held at Jerez in Spain.

Michelin is aiming at collecting as much data as possible before the start of the winter break. This would allow them to be better prepared and have tyres ready for the pre-season testing in Sepang.

The main focus of the test is to gather data on the new front tyres in varying cold conditions. The performance of the Michelin tyres at low temperatures has been an issue during the previous tests. The additional test days would not just benefit Michelin to be prepared for the pre-season test but also for the first race of the season in Qatar. The ambient track temperature in Qatar is always relatively low as it is a night race.

Ducati, Honda and Aprilia have confirmed to be a part of the additional test by Michelin already. Since the MotoGP riders have a ban on testing until the pre-season test in 2016, factories will only be sending their official test riders. From the information gathered, Michele Pirro will be testing for Ducati, Mike Di Meglio for Aprilia and Honda will be sending two test riders, Hiroshi Aoyama and Takumi Takahashi. There is no official news from Yamaha whether they would be participating in this test.

The previous tests by Michelin saw a lot of riders crashing because of the unforgiving nature of the Michelin front tyre. The riders are facing difficulty in understanding the limit of the front tyres. Front-end low-sides were characteristic of all the crashes during previous tyre testing sessions. What makes for an even more difficult scenario for Michelin is the fact that all the riders are long used to the better performing Bridgestone front tyres which could take a lot of load during breaking, corner entry and mid corner.

Clearly, Michelin needs to work a lot more on the front tyres; however, the riders are very happy about rear tyre performance. Hopefully we will see Michelin find a breakthrough during the extra test days at Jerez. The additional testing days would also be helpful for the factories to gain better understanding of the Michelin front tyres and work on their weight distribution, electronics and suspension setup to improve feedback.

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