The last preseason Test in Qatar gave squads and racers valuable feedback, but also supplied Bridgestone with the opportunity to roll out the slick compounds to be used in the initial Grand Prix of the 2010 year.

Bridgestone offered medium and extra hard front slick compounds, plus medium and hard rears for the 17 competitors in attendance, the feedback on performance was excellent in the difficult conditions.

Sand created some issues in the initial session on Thursday, however the extra front and hard rear wheels with stronger compounds, aided to fight the problems. The harder option was definately favoured by the majority of the racers for the extra durability.

The fastest racer was Casey Stoner’s lap of 1’55.353, only half a second quicker than his best race lap from 2009.  Bridgestone Tyre Development Manager Tohru Ubukata was very happy with the information received.

“During the two days of testing in Qatar we saw good and fairly consistent conditions which allowed us and the teams to gain data on all of the available slick tyre specifications that we will bring to the Qatar GP,” he explains. “Both options of front and rear slick are working well, although almost all the riders preferred the harder options. The track conditions were much improved on the second day because of the cleaning effect of a day’s running, but we can see that the track was still not perfect: Casey’s fastest lap time was 0.1s slower than his qualifying time from last year, and even at the end of the test the harder option tyres were favoured for their extra durability as the track was still quite sandy and slippery. Many riders completed long runs though, and durability was good despite this so I am happy.”

Another interesting aspect to Bridgestone’s work in Qatar was the use of another new front tyre, which World Champion Valentino Rossi provided some feedback on in Friday evening’s session.

Ubukata adds, “Again in Qatar we offered an experimental front tyre, though a different spec to the one we tested in Sepang. I would like to thank Valentino and the Fiat Yamaha Team for using this tyre in Qatar and providing some very important and valuable data that will not only help shape the future direction of our MotoGP tyre development, but also of our Battlax production tyres.”