Ducati debuts new 'Hammerhead' aero fairing

Ducati debuted its new-look aero fairing during the second day of MotoGP testing at Losail. Jorge Lorenzo and Andrea Dovizioso were eighth and 13th quickest with the design, nicknamed "Hammerhead" after an online content from MotoGP.

"For sure today was more difficult than yesterday, and we used all the session to do a lot of tests and even though the times were not so good in the final classification, it was a very productive day," Dovizioso said. "In the evening I also did a couple of exits with the new fairing: in my opinion, our engineers have done a great job because it wasn't easy to create a certain aerodynamic downforce without using the winglets.

"Now we are weighing up the pros and cons before we take a decision and also work out the tracks where this solution can give the biggest advantages."

Ducati, which pioneered the winglet two years ago, was one of the most vocal critics of the decision to move away from them, calling it a step backward.

"Frankly speaking, for me the bike will take a step backwards without wings," Ducati Corse boss Gigi Dall'igna told sportrider.com as development of Ducati's new bike was still underway in January. "That is absolutely clear. So everyone is now trying to find out the best compromise, but for sure it will not perform like it did with wings.

"In Qatar the difference will not be so huge, but at some other tracks, like Jerez for example, the situation will be a lot different than last year."

Lorenzo said he was satisfied with the team's progress.

"It's not very easy to draw conclusions from today, also because I was one of the few riders who did not use the soft tire, with which I could have probably made a significant improvement on my time," he said. "At any rate one of the positive things from this session is that we have improved on yesterday's time by three-tenths of a second. Regarding the settings, today we didn't try anything significant, but we still have some things planned which we will test tomorrow.

Riders have had mixed results with their respective new fairing options. Repsol Honda teammates Marc Marquez and Dani Pedrosa took to the Losai track with its version, and Marquez fell twice.