Grand Prix 2000 - Round 6 - Mugello - 500 Race Report

Roberts got an incredible start, followed by Rossi and Capirossi.  Rossi got through on Kenny a few corners later and Capirossi was starting to hassle Roberts.

Rossi led them across the line to commence lap 2 and Capirossi took Roberts for 2nd.  Loris took Rossi for the lead a few corners later.  Rossi is starting to look a little bit uncomfortable but Capirossi is going all out to make a gap and is sliding his Honda all over the place, on the way in and the way out.

Roberts, Abe, Checa and Barros were in the fight for 4th.   Capirossi still in the lead from Rossi and Roberts.  Kenny got Rossi a lap later, Checa and Biaggi joined the battle for 2nd.  Loris had just over a second lead.

17 laps to go and Capirossi now has a 2 second gap but is running medium tyres while Roberts in 2nd is running hard tyres so Kenny will be hoping that Capirossi is burning up his tyres so he can take him later in the race.

Roberts, Rossi, Checa, Biaggi and Barros were quite close together in the battle for 2nd.  Rossi got back in front of Roberts for 2nd with 16 laps to go.  A lap later Checa also got past Roberts to take 3rd but Kenny's Suzuki had the speed down the straight to go straight back past.  Criville bit the dirt for the 3rd time this weekend.  Biaggi pulled his finger out and got past both Checa and Roberts to move up into 3rd.

Lap 9 and Rossi had closed the gap down to 1.8 seconds behind race leader Capirossi.  Barros got through on Roberts for 4th and started challenging Biaggi for 3rd.  By lap 10 Capirossi pulled the gap back out to 2.3 seconds and Max was working hard to close Valentino Rossi down for his 2nd position.   A lap later and the gap to Capirossi was back down to 1.7 seconds as Rossi was getting a move on in order to respond to Biaggi's challenge.

Rossi and Biaggi started reeling Capirossi in, with 11 laps to go the gap was down to 1.2 seconds.  McCoy 13th.

Lap 13 and the gap now down to 8 tenths.  Race order - Capirossi, Rossi, Biaggi, Checa, Barros and Roberts in 6th.  Rossi is really making some ground on Loris now and with 9 laps to go there is half a second between Capirossi and Roberts with a further half a second back to Biaggi.  McCoy up to tenth.

Rossi started to show Capirossi a wheel every now and then on lap 14 but was having trouble putting a pass on Loris.  This allowed Biaggi to close right up on to the tail of Rossi and make it a close 3-way fight for the lead.   Rossi managed to get it past Capirossi a couple of corners in to the next lap and immediately started opening up a lead.  Garry McCoy was fastest on the track with 6 laps to go and had moved up to 8th.

Biaggi did not look to be able to make up the ground on Capirossi for the 2nd position and Rossi was not escaping away from Loris so the race is definitely not run.  McWilliams slotted in to 5th and McCoy up to 6th!  Roberts is going backwards and is now down in 8th.  McCoy was having an unbelievable run through the field but unfortunately ended up in the kitty litter, bugger.

Capirossi took the lead with 4 laps to go and his medium compound tyres seemed to be coping well with the punishment but Valentino was not giving up with the fight.  It looks as though Max is happy to watch the action from a couple of bike lengths behind in the hope of some ensuing carnage.  The action is hot and they are running wide in places and cocking up their cornering lines but the order is not changing, yet......

2 laps to go and Rossi's bike showed its speed advantage over Loris's bike down the straight but Capirossi still managed to keep the lead in to the 1st corner.  Max tried to stick a pass on Rossi a few corners later but Loris gave him no room and kept his position.  Valentino got passed Capirossi but unfortunately binned it on the next corner.  Now it is down to Loris and Max as they cross the line to commence the last lap but Capirossi looks to have enough room to keep it together for the win.  Biaggi really on Capirossi hard now and gets under Capirossi halfway around the lap but Loris got back past him the next corner. Paint swapping everywhere, Biaggi loses the front and Capirossi starts celebrating as Biaggi tries to remount.  Checa crossed the line for 2nd, McWilliams 3rd.  Roberts ended up 7th, Biaggi managed to salvage 9th and Rossi 12th.

500 Race Result

  1. Capirossi
  2. Checa
  3. McWilliams
  4. Aoki
  5. Abe
  6. Roberts
  7. Laconi
  8. Okada
  9. Biaggi
  10. Gibernau
  11. Goorbergh
  12. Rossi
  13. Cardoso
  14. Legrelle
  15. Konishi

500 Championship Standings

1 Kenny Roberts 100
2 Carlos Checa 100
3 Norick Abe 65
4 Loris Capirossi 63
5 Garry McCoy 61
6 Alex Criville 59
7 Nobuatsu Aoki 59
8 Alex Barros 52
9 Tady Okada 42
10 Valentino Rossi 41
Jeremy McWilliams - "This race was important for Aprilia so I'm really happy to have been able to bring them this result. It's been a difficult week-end with a couple of crashes but we ended up figuring out what the problem was and the race was better. This was the first time I was racing the new Aprilia 500 so it was important to do well. It works better into the corners than the old bike and this was really useful here because I had to go into the corners so hard to stay with the V4s. I said at the start of the year we could do this. We're still learning about the bike and I'm still learning about riding a 500 so there's more to come. I'll be on the podium again."