Nicky Hayden seeking more consistency

Nicky Hayden reckons he’s still got to find a more consistently fast pace to mount a regular podium challenge in the 2011 MotoGP world championship.

Hayden made a drastic improvement in his second campaign with Ducati in 2010 and the popular American was able to claim 11 top six finishes, including a third place in the inaugural Motorland Aragon clash last September.

But he has targeted being more consistently on the pace at all tracks in 2011 despite a tough winter testing campaign on Ducati’s new factory GP11 machine.

The 2006 world champion told MCN: “It gets harder the closer you get to the front but a couple of tracks last year I was definitely more consistent. I improved a lot by being quicker on Friday and wasn’t so far behind and I qualified well. But sometimes I still didn’t put it together for the whole weekend like in Germany. I was quite fast there but qualified 15th, even though I had pace to be about fifth. Some places I was too up and down, so I need to get more consistent and find that next two or three per cent. That’s the difference between fourth and fifth and being in the mix for the win.”

Shedding some light on the issues that left him two seconds off the pace at the last test session in Sepang, Hayden said he was again struggling to get the new GP11 to turn.

Team-mate Valentino Rossi has also complained about the turning issue and Hayden told MCN: “I couldn’t get the bike to turn, especially in the long corners. I’m just running wide and it is hard to get it stopped in the tight hairpins. I just get pushed off line. I can’t finish the corner, so when I do accelerate I’m still leaned over a lot on the side of the tyre and you can’t open the throttle on these things when you’re leaned over.”