Masao Furusawa is a m𝓰an under pressure. Many may not have heard of him, but the 52-year-old is the newly appointed head of Yamaha's MotoGP sports department - and so responsible for supplying Valentino Rossi with Honda beating equipment, and win Yamaha's first premier🙈-class crown since 1992.

Furusawa, who has worked with Yamah🙈a since the early 1970s, likens his head of development role to that of a chef - a chef preparing race winning high-speed machinery for new rider Rossi.

"We have prepared some🥃 ingredients, now we are mixing them together and soon w🎃e will be able to taste the result," he said at Yamaha's first tests of the year here in Malaysia.

Furusawa and Rossi are united in the goal of winning the world championship in the Italian's debut season with Yamaha, and after just two days together the Japanese boss is already impressed with the five-times world cham𓆉pion.

"I like his character and I appreciate his grasp of the technical matters that need attention. His crew♈ (many of whom left Repsol Honda with Rossi) is also a great help," he said.

"I started mid-season (last year) and have looked carefully at what we need to upgrade," he continued. "One area is horsepower and we have increased maxi𝓰mum speed too, but this is not everything in MotoGP. We investigated the chass💮is and introduced a new one at Valencia last year."

Buཧt it's this season when the results of Furusawa's direction will show - and with the #46 riding his machines there can be no excuses. This is his plan for success:

"We have prepared different specification engines and chassis and many 🦹smaller items," revealed Masao. "We currently have four types of engines and four types of chassis to try. We have five more tests before💦 the first race and we will test them all and then combine the results to make a good bike."

Furusawa also fully appreciates the pressure time puts on the factory's bid for world championship glory - the𓆏 first race, at Welkom in So🧸uth Africa, is on April 18.

"So the deadline ༒for making the best bike🥃 is two and a half months," he said in a matter-of-fact manner.