Nicky Hayden was downcast at Sepang as the American star struggled for pace on the Open class RCV1000R.

The Drive M7 Aspar rider improved his time from Tuesday by over a second but finished in 14th position on the day two times, 2.361s off the top lap by Marc Marquez.

And although Hayden was the second fastest Open class rider behind Aleix Espargaro on the FTR-M1, the 2006 world champion said he felt 'demoralised' following the opening days of the test.

"Today went slightly better, we improved the lap time quite a bit - more than one second - but the other guys improved quite a bit," Hayden said.

"We mainly improved the electronics and engine braking to the corner. For me, I've been with Ducati a long time so I have to understand a little bit more, especially on corner entry and looking at different ways of braking into the corner, deeper, which you can do with this bike.

"But regardless we've got a lot of work to do and we didn't expect to be so far off the pace. When I'm honest it's a bit demoralising to see the gap so big," he added.

"When you try to follow someone they just disappear by the time you get to the end of the straightaway. I didn't expect it."

Hayden is suffering from a lack of power on the RCV1000R and admits he's at a loss to explain how his team can squeeze more speed from the engine.

"We have a lot of stuff to try, chassis and electronics, and also I need to improve because I don't think the engine alone is two and a half seconds off. But of course there's nothing I can really do for the power," he said.

"At the first two exits yesterday and the third corner I was full, full, full [power] everywhere so there's nothing I can really do there.

"This is the engine we've got, so I don't know..."

Hayden's time of 2m 02.287s was considerably slower than the fastest Open set by Espargaro in fifth place of 2m 00.547s, although he did finish ahead of Espargaro's team-mate, Colin Edwards, on the second Forward Racing FTR-M1 in 15th position (2m 02.545s).

Hiroshi Aoyama was 18th fastest on the second Drive M7 Aspar RCV1000R with a time of 2m 03.034s.