125: Haojue withdraws from Japanese Grand Prix.

The new Chinese-backed Haojue 125GP team has withdrawn from the remainder of the Japanese Grand Prix weekend.

"We hit a technical problem on both machines in today's second free practice session and we will be unable to safely correct this problem in time for the qualifying session," explained team director Garry Taylor.

"Of course the whole team is bitterly disappointed. We are still at an early stage of the development programme and with two fly-away races as the start of the season, we simply don't have enough resources here to make the necessary countermeasures.

"We will be back in action at the GP of Spain in Jerez next week."

Riders Michel Ranseder and Matt Hoyle were ranked 33rd and 34th out of the 36 riders during the wet second free practice session.

Ranseder was 8.357sec off the pace of fastest man Julian Simon, with Hoyle 10.832sec adrift.