Rossi, Lorenzo unveil 2010 Fiat Yamaha livery

Valentino Rossi and Jorge Lorenzo unveiled their 2010 MotoGP race livery in the Sepang pit lane on Thursday morning.

The covers were taken off the factory YZR-M1s just after 10am on the morning of the first official test session of the year for race riders (test riders having taken to the Malaysian Grand Prix track on Wednesday).

Unsurprisingly, with Fiat remaining as title sponsor for a fourth year, the 2010 Yamaha livery (pictured) is almost identical to that seen in previous seasons.

Indeed, the biggest livery change seems to be the inclusion of the words "Semakin Di Depan" (Yamaha's Indonesian tag line, which means "One Step Ahead") on the tail section of both bikes.

The use of the slogan further underlines how important the huge Indonesian market is to Yamaha. In 2009 total sales by Yamaha Indonesia were in excess of 2.6 Million units - more than any other Yamaha Company in the world.

At least one of the factory's MotoGP riders is expected to make another PR trip to Indonesia after this week's test.

Rossi and Lorenzo finished first and second in the 2009 MotoGP World Championship, with six and four race wins respectively from the 17 rounds. Yamaha also won the Constructors' title and Fiat Yamaha the Teams' title.

Speaking about the forthcoming season Lin Jarvis, managing director of Yamaha Motor Racing, said: "2009 was the most successful year for Yamaha's racing activities for many years. It will be difficult to repeat such a performance but we are intending to try! We are fortunate to have the same fantastic rider line-up with Valentino and Jorge and we are looking forward to getting started with our work on track.

"Of course, Yamaha has not been able to escape the difficulties caused by the global economic situation but MotoGP forms an important part of the company's recovery plan. The MotoGP program is a very important brand image promotion activity and the racing requires us to demonstrate all of our company's power in engineering, organizational and passion if we are to be successful at the top level.

"We are extremely fortunate to have retained all of our existing loyal sponsors and even to have added a few more to the team. Our title sponsor Fiat is with us for a fourth year and Petronas, Packard Bell and Yamalube will continue as major sponsors of the team. We have two new sponsors in the form of Yamaha Indonesia, who join us with the aim of promoting their activities in Indonesia, the most important market for Yamaha at the moment, and Iveco. We have also retained all of our existing technical sponsors and suppliers.

"Last but not least I would like to say welcome back to all of our team staff and also to extend a warm welcome to our two new team members; Wilco Zeelenberg joins from the successful Yamaha Supersport team as Jorge's new team manager and Davide Marelli comes in as his new data technician."

Rossi and Lorenzo - plus Yamaha management and Tech 3 riders Colin Edwards and Ben Spies - will attend a press conference at Sepang this evening, following the end of Thursday's track action. The Sepang test concludes on Friday.