His time, on full wet tyres, was 1 minute 52.755 seconds for the 2.75-mile circuit, nearly 3.5 seconds slower than quickest man
Casey Stoner on the Marlboro Ducati.
But consider this: Toseland was fifth fastest in the dry on the Tech III Yamaha and fifth fastest in the wet. Only in the tricky, drying conditions of today's 40-minute slot in which riders competed for the
BMW Z4 M roadster did he fall off a top six pace.
The principal reason? He'd never ridden the YZR-M1 in these conditions before. Remember, too, that Hervé Poncharal's team are new to Michelin tyres this year, having been on Dunlops last season.
"We just got caught out by the weather," Toseland told a handful of hardy Brit fans as they clustered around the Tech III garage after the session. "I sat and waited for it to dry, but it didn't. Casey (Stoner) set the fastest time on his fifth lap when it was still quite damp, and no one went quicker.
"You also have to think about the possibility of getting injured – forget about that!"
"We have great tyres for the dry and great tyres for the wet," his manager Roger Burnett said. "Now we know that we have some work to do when the track is starting to dry."
Toseland has impressed everyone in his two days here with his work rate, learning rate and sheer speed. He tests for one more day here tomorrow, and then the final step in his
MotoGP apprenticeship takes place in the night trials at Qatar on February 28-29.
After that it's down to real work in the first race at Qatar on March 9.
Sunday pm - Michelin Seek Barros as Test Guru
Michelin are trying to lure veteran MotoGP rider Alex Barros from retirement to act as a test rider in the French company's battle to regain the world title.
Barros, 37, who has competed in 276 grand prix races, would undertake a role similar to that of test rider Olivier Jacque with Kawasaki, sometimes running at MotoGP official test days, and also operating a separate test programme.
Michelin would ask the two factories they currently supply, Honda and Yamaha, to provide their MotoGP models as test mules.
"We would ask both companies to supply a bike for different tests," Jean-Phillippe Weber, Michelin's director of motorcycle racing, said today.
