After spending his first two
MotoGP races with the underpowered spring-valve M1 engine, Toseland and Tech 3 team-mate
Colin Edwards will get their first taste of the pneumatic-valve powerplant - as used by factory riders
Valentino Rossi and
Jorge Lorenzo - during the Portuguese Grand Prix.
"We just bolted the [new] engines in yesterday, so I'm looking forward to that," said Toseland, sixth in his first two MotoGP races. "It's going to be a tough weekend - this is the first [MotoGP race] I've come to without knowing the circuit - but with the new engine I'm certainly going to have a bike that's capable of finishing on the podium here. So it's down to me to work hard to learn the track and get the best result we can."
Tech 3 will be hoping that the new engine can convert the team's proven qualifying speed into a full race distance.
So far this season, Edwards has qualified third on the grid for both events - with Toseland second and eighth - but Toseland's sixth positions remain the highest race result.
Edwards was seventh in Qatar and fell at
Jerez.
