YART Sets 2'06.381 in Suzuka 8 Hours Pre-Event Test

On June 19, the first day of a two-day test was held in preparation for the 45th "Coca-Cola" Suzuka 8 Hours that is set for July 19-21, 2024. It was the second test held so far following the first test in early June.

Yamaha Motor's top team in the event is the Yamalube YART Yamaha EWC Official Team, whose staff members and riders arrived in Japan on Monday, June 17 and got themselves acclimated to the time difference to get ready to ride. In the days leading up to the test, heavy rain fell in many parts of Japan, but on the morning of June 19, clear and sunny skies greeted the defending EWC champions as they arrived at Suzuka Circuit.

In the first session of the day, YART rode in Group B, showing off their YZF-R1 that featured a special Suzuka 8 Hours livery with a "YAMALUBE" logo design, denoting Yamaha Motor's brand of genuine motor oils and chemicals, to Japanese fans and media for the first time. Riders Niccolò Canepa, Marvin Fritz, and Karel Hanika took to the track to put in laps. These were their first laps of Suzuka Circuit since last year's race 10 months ago, and after quickly getting up to speed, the whole team made a solid first step toward the main event on July 21.

Looking at the combined times for Session 1 from Group A and Group B, Team HRC (that includes MotoGP rider Johann Zarco) held the top two quickest lap times with a 2'06.867 and a 2'07.097. Behind them was YART, who were still working on getting re-acclimated to Suzuka Circuit with times in the 2'08s for most of their laps. In the end YART set a 2'07.299 and 2'07.626 for 3rd and 4th overall in the session.

In the second session of the day, Ducati Team KAGAYAMA were fastest having set a 2'06.634, with YART in 2nd with a 2'07.049, which was nearly into the 2'06 range. The third session of the day saw YART set a 2'07.495 to be 4th overall. In the final night session, YART rider Niccolò Canepa clocked the fastest time of the entire day with a 2'06.381 to make YART's rivals fully aware of their presence.

#1 Yamalube YART Yamaha EWC Official Team

Karel Hanika

"It was my first time back at Suzuka after a year, so the first thing I did was try to get the feeling back. The weather and track conditions were different from last year, but I already knew the track layout well, so I was able to set some fast lap times right from the start. I'm happy to be here because I like Suzuka Circuit a lot, so I'm looking forward to the race. With my teammates, we want to look at our setup from last year's 8 Hours and our setup from Spa and combine all the good points. Tomorrow we'll make a few more small adjustments, like with the geometry. Today, I think the whole team, Yamaha and Bridgestone did really good work."

Niccolò Canepa

"The first task for today was getting back up to speed at Suzuka, and I think we did that very quickly in the first session. We did the entire testing plan we had for the day, and took all the comments from us three riders, and we'll use those to make some small changes to the bike for tomorrow. Overall, I'm satisfied with the work we did today. My two teammates both did long runs, though I didn't, and checked fuel consumption, which looked good. I set our fastest time for today, and I think it was because today is one of the coolest days I've ridden at Suzuka, so the conditions were perfect and that helped. I also had new tires on, so when I pushed we were able to set a fast time, though still not a perfect lap and not as fast as qualifying times."

Marvin Fritz

"My first lap on track was a 2'07.6, so we were already at a fast pace right from the start. We mostly focused on our race pace for today. From all the years I've raced Suzuka, I think today I had the fastest average race pace ever. My teammates were also very fast, so I think we made a good start to the test. We didn't have any issues, and the bike is working well, but there are still some small points we can improve on. The track conditions were very good today, so we were lucky that it was easy and comfortable to ride, but maybe a bit unlucky for the test because I think the race weekend will be much hotter. Tomorrow Karel and I will do some long runs, and we'll change a few settings to work on our fuel consumption."