Franco Morbidelli and Álex Márquez gave the Spielberg circuit in Austria their seal of approval, after concluding a successful two-day test at the track this afternoon.

Spielberg will host the first race of the second half of the season in just a few weeks time and both Team Estrella Galicia 0,0 Marc VDS riders are looking forward to returning, after racking up more than 300 laps between them over the course of the two days.

The main goal for Morbidelli and Márquez was learning their way around the 4.318km circuit, which appears on the MotoGP calendar for the first time this season. However the two teammates also found time to refine the set up of their Kalex Moto2 machines to better suit the characteristics of the track, which features seven right and three left corners and constant changes of elevation. 

Team Estrella Galicia 0,0 Marc VDS will return to Austria in August to get the second half of the 2016 underway.

Franco Morbidelli: 185 Laps – 1'30.1
“This test has been another positive one for us because we were able to try a lot of different things on the bike, many of which brought improvements, so I'm happy with that. The Spielberg track is really nice and great fun to ride, so I'm looking forward to our return to get the second half of the season underway next month.”

Álex Márquez: 186 Laps – 1'30.3
“I'm happy to be here in Spielberg and, after two days of testing, I can say that I like this track a lot; it's very interesting. We still need to find some improvement in the lap time when we return here for the race, but I'm confident that we know how to do this. Now it's time to relax a little and recharge the batteries before coming back to Austria to start the second half of the season, hopefully with a good result.” 

Naoya Kaneko: Chief Engineer – Álex Márquez
“We were a little apprehensive ahead of this test because the weather forecast didn't look promising, but finally we've had good conditions up until three o'clock on both days, so it's been a very productive test. We managed to complete our planned test program so we now have a good base set up for this track, but we also have a clear understanding of where we need to improve further when we return in August for the race.”