The MotoGP paddock returned to action today at the Sachsenring in eastern Germany and Valentino Rossi and his crew were quick to get back to work, with the aim of recouping the points they lost last time out in Assen. The hot and sunny weather today was a welcome respite from the rain that has been following the paddock around Europe, and a full day of dry set-up time left the Fiat Yamaha rider 4th in the combined standings.

Rossi, who currently lies second in the championship, made a good start this morning and finished the first session in third, just 0.299 off Casey Stoner. He was confident of making more improvement this afternoon but a small set-up change failed to reap the expected rewards and he was unable to improve on his time from this morning.

He still finished the practice in fourth place but a second's gap to the lead rider means that Rossi and his crew face a hard day's work tomorrow to make up for the time they lost this afternoon. His team-mate Jorge Lorenzo meanwhile made an improvement of almost half a second this afternoon and finished the day in sixth.

"For sure I'm not happy after today's practice! This afternoon we tried some modifications to the setting and we decided to try a softer set-up, but things didn't work how we hoped and we couldn't improve our time. In the fast corners I wasn't fast enough, and I was always a little bit wide. This afternoon I couldn't ride how I wanted to. Obviously this afternoon's choice is not the right way for us at this circuit and therefore tomorrow morning we will return to this morning's set-up and try to close the gap to Casey.

I didn't try the new electronics today and actually at the moment it's more likely that we won't this weekend, but I did try some different Bridgestone tyres and we found one which we think will be okay for the race. I am confident that our potential is more than today so we will do our best to improve tomorrow."

"We started well this morning but unfortunately we weren't able to improve our lap times this afternoon. We tried something different for the second session and it didn't have the right result so now we have to analyse all of today's information to make sure that we make up for this tomorrow. We had a chance to test some tyres and they're not so bad here but of course we need more time to improve the package as a whole at this tricky track."

Fiat Yamaha Team rider Jorge Lorenzo made the most of the sunshine at the Sachsenring today to make some good progress on the set-up of his YZR-M1, finishing the first day of practice for the German Grand Prix sixth in the combined standings. The 21-year-old has finally been able to return to his full training schedule following his recent spate of injuries and proved he's feeling fitter and more confident by improving his lap times steadily throughout today.

Lorenzo, who has never won at this track, struggled a little in the cooler morning practice, lacking some rear grip and finishing tenth. This afternoon however it was a different story and, with temperatures touching 30 degrees, the Michelin-shod rider improved his time by nearly half a second to finish fifth in the session and sixth in the combined standings.

His team-mate Valentino Rossi was just 0.098 seconds ahead of him this afternoon but with a gap of over a second to the lead rider, both Lorenzo and Rossi will be looking to make more significant progress tomorrow.

"I feel like I have a lot of confidence here compared to the last few races, and this is a nice feeling because it's enabling me to ride much more aggressively. We had some problems with the rear grip this morning and I was happy about the improvements that we made this afternoon, but the bike setting is still not perfect and I feel like we should be going faster.

The problem is that, although I was in fifth place this afternoon, the gap to Stoner in front is very big and it's hard for us to understand how he is going so much faster than us! From this it is clear, even though I have a good feeling, that the bike is not performing exactly as it should and therefore we need to try to improve our package more.

Of course I also need to keep building my confidence and improving my riding as I get more used to a MotoGP bike at this track. I hope that tomorrow we can close the gap to the front."

"To start with in the morning session we had some problems; specifically we didn't have enough rear grip. This afternoon however things were much better and we were able to improve our pace by about half a second, which made everyone much happier.

We still have some work to do because we still need to improve the rear grip; it's not a problem that can be attributed to either the bike or the tyres, it's just to do with our package as a whole. Now we hope that the weather continues like this tomorrow and this will enable the team to prepare some other solutions to try in order to fine-tune things further."

The second half of the 2008 MotoGP world championship got off to a mixed start for the Tech 3 Yamaha team in Germany today.

Colin Edwards once again impressed with the third fastest time as he looks to continue his own superb run of form. Working on improving front tyre grip, Edwards' best lap of 1.22.463 saw him finish top Michelin rider as he goes in search of sixth successive top five finish in Sunday's 30-lap race.

 The Texan's confidence wasn't dented by a crash at the final corner when he was lying second, and he believes further improvements to front tyre grip will help him mount a serious challenge for a third podium finish of the season.

Today's opening free practice sessions though proved a much tougher affair for rookie James Toseland. After finding himself on familiar territory at Donington and Assen, Toseland again faced the challenging prospect of learning the technical Sachsenring track from scratch.

The 27-year-old, who walked away from an early crash this morning, is confident he can significantly lower his lap times tomorrow having made big strides in improving the set-up of his YZR-M1 machine.

"This morning I went out and I didn't have a lot of feeling from the front. I thought it was a small issue with grip so we played around with the bike and it didn't really get any better. The feeling I'm always looking for just wasn't there and I'm a front-end guy. I just couldn't get the front to gel with me. I tried a different front tyre this afternoon - a harder one - and that felt better but it is something that we never use.

This place is so hard on front tyres and what we normally use race after race wouldn't have the durability, so Michelin have had to improvise a little bit and it was just a feeling that I'm not used to.

I went out there and got going and did a couple of good laps and the next thing I crashed. I braked for the last corner and that was it. You know when you do something wrong because when you get in they're too hot and your eyes bulge out, you know you are not going to make it. But I didn't even do that. I just cruised into the corner like normal and I was down.

I had zero warning. Michelin and the team came up with some ideas to try and create some more front feel and I went out on the spare bike and at the end I wasn't even really pushing and I did a 22 and it seemed easy because I had some feel. So a big thanks to Michelin and my guys for the improvements we found. Honestly though this is the best package I've ever rolled out of the truck on a Friday at this circuit.

I normally come here and it is a nightmare for me to get the bike working. But today it worked like a charm and Michelin have done a great job with the rear tyres. They are awesome, so with more feel now from the front I'm really confident."

"It is quite a difficult track to learn and really technical. It is one of those tracks where it is blind in a lot of places and you need to keep on the throttle. So you really need to know where you're going. We have tried a lot of things today, which has been interesting and right at the end I finally found a bit of rhythm in the 23s but then the chequered flag came out.

We've been working between two settings to see which one is more comfortable and now at least we know the direction to go in to make the bike more rideable. It looks a lot worse on paper than it is and I'm still upbeat. I'm bottom of the list but at the end I saw a bit of a light at the end of the tunnel, so fingers crossed it will be dry tomorrow. The problem is we are struggling to find the set-up for the shorter bike. It is much easier to find with the longer bike but that one has a few issues.

With the shorter bike it is the same problem as before, there is too much weight transition on that bike under braking and I've not got much feel from the rear tyre on the entry. The crash on the third lap this morning put me off a bit.

That was my mistake. I just touched the white line going into that lefthander and it just lost traction as I got back onto the tarmac and down I went. Both of my arms are black and blue because the stones are quite big in the gravel. I went in backwards and dug my arms in a bit and it has really battered them."

1 Casey Stoner Ducati AUS 1'21.582

2 Alex De Angelis Honda SMR 1'21.993

3 Colin Edwards Yamaha USA 1'22.463

4 Valentino Rossi Yamaha ITA 1'22.617

5 Daniel Pedrosa Honda ESP 1'22.759

6 Jorge Lorenzo Yamaha ESP 1'22.894

6 Shinya Nakano Honda JPN 1'22.922

8 Nicky Hayden Honda USA 1'22.975

9 Andrea Dovizioso Honda ITA 1'22.999

10 Randy De Puniet Honda FRA 1'23.116

11 Sylvain Guintoli Ducati FRA 1'23.209

12 Loris Capirossi Suzuki ITA 1'23.274

13 Toni Elias Ducati ESP 1'23.366

14 Chris Vermeulen Suzuki AUS 1'23.411

15 Anthony West Kawasaki AUS 1'23.452

17 James Toseland Yamaha GBR 1'23.864

-Yamaha Racing-