MotoGP Sepang Test Ends With Marco Simoncelli On Top of The Boards

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Marco Simoncelli's San Carlo Gresini Honda Racing RC212V sits on display outside the team's garages during the Red Bull Indianapolis MotoGP Weekend in August of 2010. The '08 250CC World Champion finished his rookie year in the premier MotoGP Series in the 8th position in the overall standings, and had a great, consistent finish to the season. Throughout the 18 race season, the Honda satellite rider only suffered two DNFs, and finished second in the running for Rookie of the Year to Ben Spies on his Tech 3 Monster Energy Yamaha.
After having ridden a two-stroke based racing motorcycle for years, his overall transition to the more powerful and heavier four-stroke class has shown some great strides after suffering early season teething problems. Setting fast time in the first official test of the season can't be a bad thing for the personable Italian, either.
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Marco Simoncelli lurked around in the top five of testing times during the three day test held at the Sepang Circuit in Malaysia last week, but he knew when to go for the gusto on the closing day to set fastest overall time for the first official test of the year in the run for the 2011 MotoGP World Championship. Riding his San Carlo Gresini Honda, the 'Big Hair' rider bested new Repsol Honda teamster Casey Stoner (and his new team mates Dani Pedrosa and Andrea Dovizioso) in setting the fastest time of the test on the closing day. Eight riders finished the test within .777 seconds of one another, and 10 within just over a second of one another.

The second test of the year will see the best road racers in the world return to Sepang on February 22-24 and the final test will be held at night in Qatar on March 13-14, several days before the first round of the season on the Losail Circuit in Doha on March 17-20. With this being the last season for the 800s before the move back to 990s for the 2012 season, these close test times at least help to show some promise of a year of good, competitive racing in the MotoGP Series.

Here's the official wrap up for the 3-day Sepang MotoGP test, thanks to the great folks at Cycle News.com:

http://www.cyclenews.com/articles/road-racing/2011/02/03/simoncelli-leads-honda-sweep-in-sepang

Courtesy of Ultimate Motorcycling.com comes this release (with some rider quotes) about the first official test for the 2011 MotoGP World Championship Series season:

http://www.ultimatemotorcycling.com/2011-sepang-motogp-test-results-day-3
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