Valentino Rossi told the media the Ducati team's Mugello test last week gave "promising" results, and he is looking forward to riding on the Catalunya circuit.

"The Catalunya circuit has always been one of my favorites, and although it's hard to imagine another podium, we must still do our best to finish with the front riders," the Italian rider said.

For his part, Ducati technical chief Filippo Preziosi said the Mugello test gave Ducati useful information towards continued improvement of Ducati bikes.

"I'd say it was a very useful test because we were able to gather interesting information on the different areas of the bike for which we had planned a robust test program," Preziosi said.

"We worked on different configurations of the electronics, engine and chassis, including an aluminum swingarm. Now we want to go to other tracks, which is exactly what we'll do in Barcelona and Aragon, to test the validity of the solutions we've found, in order to understand if we've effectively taken a small step in the right direction," the chief added.

Ducati star rider Rossi has just recently regained his momentum despite critics saying he was retiring soon. He finished at second place in the French MotoGP at Le Mans on May 20.

Rossi was the fifth placer in last year's Barcelona round, with his Desmosedici. He was only 7.351sec away from race winner Casey Stoner of Australia.

Stoner, meanwhile, finished third at Le Mans. Rossi celebrated this win over the Honda rider, although he was second only to Spain's 2010 world champion, Yamaha rider Jorge Lorenzo.

Realizing that his Desmosedici is an amazing ride in wet conditions, Rossi remained realistic about the ride's need for improvement in dry conditions.

"Two Sundays ago, we got a nice result because we took advantage of the wet track, a condition in which we know we can be competitive, but we're aware that we must continue improving in normal, dry conditions," Rossi told reporters barely a week before MotoGP Catalunya.

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Valentino Rossi Shows off Critics: "At last I'm back on the podium!"