Still not at 100 percent fitness, Nicky Hayden is preparing for his debut on the GP12 in Malaysia on January 31.

Currently recovering from a broken left shoulder blade and two broken ribs from a flat track crash during the last week of December, Hayden has been working on his fitness from his California home that he shares with his brothers in preparation for his debut on the Ducati GP12 at Sepang next week.

The American hasn’t ridden the new GP12 yet, nor was he able to test the version of it Valentino Rossi rode at the Valencia test in early November, as he broke his wrist in a crash at the final race of 2011. And while he is working hard, undergoing physical therapy and engaging in his daily training activities, Hayden said in a tweet on January 25th that he is getting better, but that Malaysia is going to be difficult.


The winter months are normally used for intensive training, as an 18 race schedule supplemented by testing and public relations events and does not allow for work on building a base level of fitness, and while the winters are not bad in his hometown of Owensboro in Kentucky, California allows him the choice of which type of two-wheeled training he will engage in day to day, whether it’s road cycling, mountain biking or dirt bike riding, all of which are his preferred method of training.

"I love motorcycles, off-road, on-road…anything. I grew up flat tracking and I still follow it and do it for training," he recently said in an interview with the online magazine On Track Off Road. And should he need to defend his choice of using flat-track to train despite the obvious risk of injury, Hayden said, "I believe riding any kind of motorbike is the best training. You can do as many push ups as you want at the gym, but there is nothing like using the muscles and the brain when you are on two-wheels."