BatiFan Blog | The Alvaro Bautista Fan Blog | Rizla Suzuki MotoGP

Here’s pics of the new 2010 livery on Alvaro’s bike, as crafted by Troy Lee Designs.
Full info and discussions at www.batifans.com and www.alvarobautista.co.uk

A very special announcement for you, as we at BatiFans.com introduce this year’s RACECARD Competition, featuring our greatest prize yet: a pair of Alvaro’s racing gloves, used by Bati this coming season and signed by him too – courtesy of our very special sponsors REV’IT! Sport International, suppliers of Alvaro’s leathers in 2010.
REV’iT! will also be providing some runners-up prizes of t-shirts, again exclusively signed by Alvaro himself.

Those of you who have been forum members at BatiFans.com for a while and who may have played RACECARD 2009 will need no introduction to the game; it’s simple – you just predict Alvaro’s qualifying and race positions race by race across the season and you score points for correct predictions.

We will be posting up the topic for the first round in the week ahead of the first race, and you can find out more about RACECARD 2010 – and keep up to date with an ongoing league table at this address:
www.batifans.com/racecard
The competition is open to forum members only, so if you’re not already a member, then join now! This prize is too good to miss!

To find out more about REV’IT! and their ranges of bike and fashion gear go to: www.revit.eu

Decent looking progress today, with Alvaro finishing the day in 10th (having been up as high as 8th) – though only covering 25 laps.
Here’s the order at close of play…

1. Rossi (Yamaha) 2.00.271
2. Stoner (Ducati) 2.00.512
3. Hayden (Ducati) 2.00.703
4. Edwards (Yamaha) 2.00.988
5. Spies (Yamaha) 2.01.014
6. Capirossi (Suzuki) 2.01.320
7. Dovizioso (Honda) 2.01.439
8. Pedrosa (Honda) 2.01.478
9. Aoyama (Honda) 2.01.692
10. Bautista (Suzuki) 2.01.732
11. De Puniet (Honda) 2.01.980
12. Melandri (Honda) 2.02.078
13. Barberà (Ducati) 2.02.4080
14. Kallio (Ducati) 2.02.082
15. Yamaha T 2.02.287
16. Espargarò (Ducati) 2.02.367
17. Simoncelli (Honda) 2.03.689
18. Yamaha O 2.04.500

Alvaro’s learning experience continues with the second Sepang test where today he ran well and, despite a small spill, he finished the session with the 9th fastest time – a very creditable figure in itself and the fastest of the genuine series rookies and reassuringly close indeed to the times of the likes of Dani Pedrosa.
Top work and we’ll see how it continues tomorrow…

Here’s the timings:

1. Rossi (Yamaha) 2.01.068
2. Stoner (Ducati) 2.01.219
3. Dovizioso (Honda) 2.01.631
4. Capirossi (Suzuki) 2.01.687
5. Spies (Yamaha) 2.01.843
6. Edwards (Yamaha) 2.01.897
7. Pedrosa (Honda) 2.02.036
8. Kallio (Ducati) 2.02.038
9. Bautista (Suzuki) 2.02.078
10. Melandri (Honda) 2.02.086
11. Hayden (Ducati) 2.02.221
12. Aoyama (Honda) 2.02.419
13. Espargarò (Ducati) 2.02.447
14. Barbera (Ducati) 2.02.485
15. De Puniet (Honda) 2.02.535
16. Simoncelli (Honda) 2.03.254

Rizla Suzuki MotoGP riders Loris Capirossi and Alvaro Bautista visited the Suzuki Factory at Hamamatsu in Japan earlier this week, en-route to the second test of the year at Sepang in Malaysia.

Alvaro and Loris were joined on the trip to Suzukis headquarters by Team Manager Paul Denning and were given a tour of the base for Suzukis global activities.

The trio were shown around the Suzuki Plaza museum by Suzukis Directors Mr.Toshihiro Suzuki and Mr. Masanori Atsumi and Managing Officer Mr. Sadayuki Inobe. The group were able to inspect many of Suzukis historical products including original Suzuki looming machines, Suzuki’s first ever powered two-wheeler the Power Free motorised bicycle , the Colleda – the first true motorcycle produced by Suzuki – and the RM62 (50cc), which won Suzukis first motorcycle Grand Prix at the Isle of Man TT in 1962.

They also visited Suzukis race department and met with engineers to discuss the detailed progress that is being made in the development of the 2010 Suzuki GSV-R that the pair will be riding during this seasons MotoGP World Championship.

The riders now head to Malaysia for an important second test this week. The pair will be trying the latest updates for their Suzuki GSV-Rs at the 5,548m Sepang International Circuit. Capirossi had a promising test there earlier this month when he finished sixth overall on the timesheets and new team-mate Bautista will be looking to continue with the impressive learning development that he has shown since making the move up to MotoGP from the 250cc class.

Alvaro Bautista:
“I want to say thank you to Suzuki for their invitation and for a great experience today. I am new to MotoGP, and new to Suzuki, but I really feel more like part of the Suzuki family each day. The engineering facility is amazing, it really opened my eyes to what goes on to support us and after visiting the museum I know a lot more about Suzukis history. It is incredible to see such a huge company still feeling like a family business and everyone is so friendly and welcoming. I did my best to tell the engineers my exact feedback from the bike, but first I need to push my own level to the maximum and get to the limit of the bike – then its my right to complain and request better performance, but not yet! I feel the same as Loris – very motivated and very sure that Suzuki will do its maximum to support us.”

New Rizla Suzuki MotoGP signing Alvaro Bautista acquitted himself well at the 5,548m Sepang International Circuit during his first visit on an 800cc Grand Prix bike. He completed 88 laps during the two days and recorded a quickest time of 2’03.274. Bautista got into a good rhythm throughout the test and made many changes to his GSV-R to get the set-up right for his riding style, whilst improving steadily on his lap-time.
Alvaro – and teammate Loris Capirossi – will now both head off to Suzuki’s headquarters in Hamamatsu, Japan before returning to Sepang for the second test later this month. The two will be in race action at the first event of the year at Losail in Qatar on Sunday 11th April.
Here’s key quotes from Alvaro and Team Manager Paul Denning…

Alvaro Bautista:
“It was a good test and I managed to learn a lot. This was my first time here on the MotoGP bike after a long time without riding, and it was amazing how much faster everything seemed to happen compared to the 250! Day one just felt like starting all over again! I made steps with my speed and it was a shame we lost some practice this morning due to the rain, but even with this the team improved the feeling of the bike a lot and now I think I can start to push more.
I am now looking forward to the next test and we certainly have a good base, and I feel ready to work when we get back to Sepang later this month.”

Paul Denning, Team Manager:
“This has been a good shake-down test and has answered some questions for us, but we still need to find the correct solutions in one or two areas. The engineers will take the information back to Japan and the race department guys will be working flat out to find the necessary improvements for the next two tests. At the moment, I have to really thank Loris because we rely on him to give us the direction, and this means he has a really detailed workload! It’s tough for him because he knows he can go so much quicker when the base is fixed, but he also knows that we have to improve the bike a lot to avoid the same problems as 2009. We would rather leave Sepang a bit further down the order than 2009 but have a better race bike come the first GP!
Alvaro is working well, riding within himself and learning everything step by step. His riding style changed a little over the 2 days and he’s gradually becoming a MotoGP rider! At the moment he is doing everything we are asking of him, he improved steadily over the test and we are convinced that we will start to see big steps when he gets into the full rhythm of riding a MotoGP bike. Overall we are quite positive after this first test, but we all still know there is a lot more to do to achieve our targets.”