Uphill start for Ducati in Jerez

Jerez (Spain) 30 April 2004 – Ducati Marlboro Team riders Troy Bayliss and Loris Capirossi used the two hours of testing on race Friday to continue the development work of their Desmosedici GP4s, focusing in particular on the new swingarm and set-ups with different weight distributions. Loris and Troy concluded provisional qualifying for the first European round of the 2004 MotoGP World Championship in 15th and 17th position.
However, they hope to have collected a good base of data to work on tomorrow in order to improve the performance of the bike in fast corners in particular.

“We tried a new swingarm and different weight distributions.” Says Ducati Corse CEO Claudio Domenicali. “Tonight during the technical meeting we will hear the opinions of the riders and decide where to focus more during tomorrow's tests. Today both riders used one bike with new parts and the other identical to the one used in Welkom, but tomorrow each rider should have two identical bikes available to test the race tyres. After the briefing we will decide which set-up to maintain."
Unfortunately, rain and bad weather are forecast for Saturday and Sunday.

Ducati Press