The test is being carried out between 4pm and 11pm local time to allow teams to prepare for the conditions they will face in the first race of the season at the same circuit in two weeks, which takes place at 9pm at night under the floodlights in Qatar.

An air temperature of 28 degrees greeted that teams as they arrived, therefore a lot of riders didn't plan on taking advantage of the early part of the afternoon to head out on track, preferring to wait until sunset when the cooler track temperature will not only mean better grip but will also allow the teams to collect more relevant data for the forthcoming race.

Yamaha will continue the development of their full seamless shift gearbox at Qatar after announcing during the week that they would be using it for the 2015 season, having tested an “evolution” of their previous gearbox at the second Sepang test.

The Ducati Factory Team brought two GP14.3 bikes for riders Andrea Iannone and Andrea Dovizioso to ride during the early afternoon before switching to the new GP15 machine they debuted at the last test in Malaysia in the evening. The team say they have brought a “significant update” to Qatar, although they did not reveal what it was.

It was a quiet start to the test with just a handful of riders heading out on the 5.4km circuit before 6pm with most of those testing just testing some electronic updates and waiting for the track conditions to improve.

It was Dovizioso who led the way after three hours with the times starting to tumble, registering a 1’55.898, while Rossi was the first rider to crash as he fell at turn 8 on just his 3rd lap on his Movistar Yamaha YZR-M1 but was not injured.