ond only to Jorge Martin on the
first day. Also, the new power-up
weight-down Honda was the
biggest improver, with Joan Mir
a second quicker than his quali-
fying time for the 2021 Sepang
GP. But he was still some seven-
tenths off the pace.
Less surprising is that Ducatis
dominated the show ominously
in a fast three days. All 23 run-
ners were inside the race lap
record, and the top 10 inside
Bagnaia's best-so-far pole last
year: 1'57.491. The real elite
was in the 1'56 bracket—four of
them: Bagnaia, Martin, Bastiani-
ni, and Alex Marquez.
All on Ducatis, the first three
on the latest model. Of the top
10 times, seven went to Des-
mosedici riders. Best of the rest:
Binder's KTM in seventh, with
astonishing rookie Acosta ninth,
and Mir top Honda in 10th.
With another two days of test-
ing at Qatar before engine and
aero designs are frozen (although
W
hat's in the wind for the
76th season of Mo-
toGP? Well—you name
it. Wings and winglets, scoops
and scooplets, seat superstruc-
tures, and bulging shapes sug-
gest the fairings are suffering
from the middle-aged spread
and creeping obesity.
There were a few surprises
when the latest bikes broke
cover for the opening tests at
Malaysia, not least that Pedro
Acosta was amazingly fast, sec
-
P110
CN IIIN THE PADDOCK
BY MICHAEL SCOTT
WIND AND FURY,
AND ANOTHER DUCATI
DOMINATION
Honda showed up with
an elaborate combination
of stegosaurus half-
upright wings with a
horizontal half-wing
in the back.
