MotoReview

Valentino Rossi

"I thought we had solved a lot of the problems yesterday but today they came back. The bike is still vibrating and with the qualifying tyre the problem became worse because the extra grip on the rear pushed the front even harder. Basically we are losing time in every part of the corner. Also the crash at the start of the session didn't help but we can't use that as an excuse. I have won the first race of the season every year since 2001 but it is going to be difficult tomorrow. I have always found that it helps to start the season with a win so I will still be going for it!"

Colin Edwards

"I suppose you could say we are up the creek but the important day is tomorrow so we still have a paddle! Just when we thought we had the problem sorted out it has come creeping back. We've had three days of tests here and now two days this weekend but we just can't get on top of it. The vibration in the corners comes in at a certain speed so the effect is like having a speed limiter on the bike. To make things worse I had a puncture in my first qualifying tyre so we lost time at the end of the session too. Things don't look to be going too well for us at the moment but we'll try to pull a rabbit out of the hat tomorrow."

Chris Vermeulen

"I am quite happy with today. We have made some progress with the Bridgestone front tyre - which really helped the bike to turn better. The crew worked really well today and helped me to find what I was looking for. This afternoon we used some qualifiers and managed to move myself up the grid to 11th. I was hoping to get into the top 10, but we'll work on that tomorrow!"

John Hopkins

"I'd say that we concentrated a lot on race set-up today. Everything went really well and we have made some good steps forward for tomorrow's race. Over the winter one of my goals has been to put in consistently quick laps and unfortunately I wasn't able to get my head around the qualifiers today. I just couldn't get in a fast lap and kept making little mistakes. This means we'll have to start on the fourth row - which is a lot further back than we wanted to be - but I really hope we will do better in the race than we did in qualifying. I need a good start tomorrow and then not to let anyone get away from me, then see what happens."