Valentino Rossi begins home challenge in Misano sunshine

Valentino Rossi made a strong start to his second home race of the season today, finishing second on the opening day of action at the San Marino Grand Prix. The Misano circuit is just 15km north of the Fiat Yamaha rider's home town of Tavullia on the Adriatic coast, and the local hero is keen to delight his hordes of fans by adding another Italian win to his victory in Mugello earlier this year.

The bad weather that has followed the paddock around Europe finally gave way to the Italian summer today, with temperatures in the low 30s soaring to 45 degrees on track. This morning saw Rossi in fifth but a few set-up changes and some work on Bridgestone tyres this afternoon saw him improve and he finished the session 0.418 seconds off Casey Stoner in second.

"We made quite a good start today but not as good as we could have hoped, so we still have some work to do in order to close the gap to Casey. At the moment the main problem is T4, where I am quite slow and so we really need to look at the data and work out why.

Anyway we're still second so we're close, but I hope tomorrow to be closer because it seems that everyone is quite competitive here so we're going to have to work hard. We have some ideas and we will see what we can do. It's great to be racing in the sunshine so close to my home, on the track which was the first one I ever rode on, and I really hope we can make it a fantastic weekend for all of the fans."

"For the first day it hasn't been so bad and we're in quite good shape. It's clear that there are some areas in which we can and need to improve, so now we will use the information we have gathered today to work on those areas and refine our set up.

We have worked through a few different things today on the setting and we have also tried some different tyres, and we're confident that we have good potential. Luckily, for once, we can expect the same weather again tomorrow so this will give us the chance to check everything we've learnt today."

Following on from his recent successful test in Brno, when he made some positive steps forward with his Michelin tyres, Jorge Lorenzo was in good shape today on the first day of the Grand Prix of San Marino at Misano. The Fiat Yamaha Team rider finished the day in seventh overall and, more importantly, feeling confident and positive about the weekend's task.

The 21-year-old, who won the 250cc race here last year, made a good start to the morning with the fourth fastest time and then improved by just under four tenths this afternoon. He will be hoping to make some further set-up improvements tomorrow morning, when the hot weather looks set to continue, before attempting to return to the front row in the afternoon's qualifying session. Lorenzo's team-mate Valentino Rossi was second fastest today, 0.418 seconds behind Casey Stoner.

I'm very happy today. We had a good test after Brno and now here today I feel that the tyres are much better at this track than they were there, so I am feeling even more confident. I don't want to make any predictions about the race or talk about results; first of all we have to wait until tomorrow to see if we can continue like this.

I think I can improve even more because everything feels better than two weeks ago, so tomorrow we will try to keep going in this way. The surface here is not new, like it was in Brno, and this is better for Michelin, but we need to make one more step in order to be at the level that we want."

"This is definitely a different situation form the last two races! Here, as expected from last year's data, Michelin tyres are more competitive and they are giving us the chance to be back at the top end of the classification. The test in Brno was very important to improve the tyre situation, but we still need to work more with Michelin to further improve the grip level because we're still not as fast as we would like to be.

We need to improve our set-up more for this track because the front of the bike is still not stable enough on the hard braking and we need to work more on the suspension."

The Tech 3 Yamaha team returned to the top ten in scorching hot conditions in Misano today, with Colin Edwards fourth fastest on the opening day of free practice.

And boosted by improvements with the performance of Michelin's tyres, British team-mate James Toseland was tenth quickest after logging fast and consistent times throughout the opening day.

Looking to strengthen his bid for fourth place in the championship in the final third of the season, Edwards made a brilliant start this morning when he clocked the second fastest time. Edwards lapped within 0.002s of reigning world champion Casey Stoner, and his best time of 1.35.424 secured him fourth overall, as further tests on his Yamaha YZR-M1 race settings this afternoon failed to see an improvement in his lap time.

Toseland capitalised on the improvements made by Michelin as he ended the day with a best lap of 1.36.105. He's confident of further improvements tomorrow having completed his 23-laps in this afternoon's session on the same set of Michelin tyres, gaining valuable endurance information ahead of Sunday's 28-lap race.

"I was really fired up this morning and it all felt pretty natural and the bike felt good. The tyres seemed to work great for ten laps but when I went out on them again to check the endurance this afternoon it didn't feel as good. Maybe it was the temperature because it was a bit hotter this afternoon but I went out thinking it would be the same as this morning. I felt like I was riding well, but the pace just wasn't there as it had been this morning.

I rode my second bike this afternoon and while they are always supposed to be the same, it is always different in some small way and it felt more rigid than this morning with the chassis. So I don't know if that also might have contributed to the times just not being as fast. I need to back-to-back the bikes tomorrow and see which one I am going to race because I've also got some small issues with wear on the rear tyre and it is similar to Brno.

I've never really seen a wear pattern like that before so I'll sit down with Michelin and my guys tonight and see if we can figure something out. We have still got some work to do but I feel more confident that at the last few races and I'll looking to get that challenge for fourth in the championship back on track."

"I'm pretty pleased to be back in the top ten and we worked hard on the race set-up, only running one set of tyres through the whole session. I did 23 laps on the tyres and I was still doing low and consistent 36s.

We have had some issues with the tyres and I really wanted to make sure we have got the endurance for the race. I think if we had put a fresh set of tyres in at the end there was definitely a 35 in there, so I'm not too worried about being in tenth because it feels like there is plenty more to come.

It is good because I'm able to do the pace quite comfortably. At the last three races I have been uncomfortable on 12 or 13 corners where here it's just two! It's a good base to start from and a big thanks to Michelin. We knew they had the capabilities to do it and they are working hard. There is still a lot to do but at least it shows they are pushing hard. I am sat here knowing that with hard work we might have an outside chance of fighting for a podium and that's what I'm here for.

At the last three rounds I've had no chance of that and I've known it on Friday afternoon, so I feel well up for it. We need good and consistent grip to give Michelin good feedback and give them a direction they want and that's what we have done today."

1 Casey Stoner Ducati AUS 1'34.806

2 Valentino Rossi Yamaha ITA 1'35.224

3 Loris Capirossi Suzuki ITA 1'35.377

4 Randy De Puniet Honda FRA 1'35.620

5 Chris Vermeulen Suzuki AUS 1'35.743

6 Jorge Lorenzo Yamaha ESP 1'35.766

7 Alex De Angelis Honda SMR 1'35.861

8 Colin Edwards Yamaha USA 1'35.913

9 Shinya Nakano Honda JPN 1'36.100

10 James Toseland Yamaha GBR 1'36.105

11 Nicky Hayden Honda USA 1'36.189

12 Daniel Pedrosa Honda ESP 1'36.219

13 Andrea Dovizioso Honda ITA 1'36.356

14 Toni Elias Ducati ESP 1'36.425

15 Sylvain Guintoli Ducati FRA 1'36.619

-Yamaha Racing -