MotoGP 2006 - Round Three

Dani Pedrosa capitalised on his first ever pole position to lead the field into turn one but the young Spaniard then ran wide which allowed Colin Edwards, John Hopkins, Sete Gibernau and Shinya Nakano to shuffle him back to fifth position by turn two. Casey Stoner and Nicky Hayden were running sixth and seventh respectively as the field commenced the second lap of the 22 lap race. Capirossi, Melandri and Rossi rounded out the early top ten.

Stoner and Hayden made short work of Nakano and closed on the back of Gibernau. Out front Edwards was running strong and fellow American John Hopkins was not letting him get away but this pair had a handy gap over the rest of the field as they started lap three. Gibernau was still holding down third place but a triumvirate of Honda machines were right on his tail and Pedrosa the man leading that charge after getting the better of Stoner on lap three.

Pedrosa took third place from Gibernau early on lap four. That lap also marked the demise of Chris Vermeulen after the Rizla Suzuki man crashed out of the race. Team-mate John Hopkins was the fastest man on the track on lap three and was only a couple of bike lengths behind race leader Colin Edwards. Dani Pedrosa was charging towards them though and Nicky Hayden was following that example after getting the better of Stoner and then Gibernau to promote himself into fourth position. Rossi had worked his way up to eighth place and was challenging Nakano for seventh after dispensing with Capirossi and Melandri. Rossi took that seventh position from Nakano on lap seven and closed on Stoner and Capirossi. Further up front Pedrosa had closed the gap to the leaders down considerably and by lap seven was right with Hopkins and Edwards. Hayden was still running fourth and also closing on the leaders but Pedrosa looked to have an edge over his more experienced team-mate. Rossi took sixth place from Stoner on lap eight and set his sights on Sete Gibernau.

Hopkins did brilliantly to hold Pedrosa off for a few laps with some desperate late braking but on lap nine finally had to surrender that second position and Pedrosa then went one better to take the lead from Colin Edwards. Hayden then pushed Hopkins back to fourth and made short work of Colin Edwards as Pedrosa had started to pull away as soon as he got the lead. Hayden's quick moves on Hopkins and Edwards a quest to prevent his young team-mate from running away out in front.

Meanwhile a little further back Rossi had got the better of Gibernau and Stoner then pushed the Ducati man further back to seventh.

At the halfway point of the race it was Pedrosa leading Hayden by 1.4 seconds, Edwards in third place, Hopkins fourth and then a three second gap back to Rossi and Stoner.

On lap 15 Stoner ran in too deep under brakes and had a small excursion off the circuit which lost him a lot of time. Rossi had closed to within striking distance of Hopkins and Edwards as the pair battled over the final podium position. Hayden set a new fastest lap of the race in his quest to chase down Pedrosa but was making no significant ground on the young Spaniard. Rossi then looked down at his Yamaha with some sort of problem and the reigning world champion returned to pitlane where his Camel Yamaha team put in a new rear tyre but as he left the pits the team noticed a huge chunk out of his front tyre and tried to get him to stop but it was too late and Rossi left pitlane standing on the pegs looking down on his front tyre and he could soon see that his race was over once he got a look at his destroyed front tyre. It was a forlorn sight watching the #46 Yamaha limp its way round for a lap before he could return again to pitlane where this time he parked it in the box.

Up front Hayden hadn't given up on trying to steal the glory from his team-mate and set a new fastest lap of the race again with four laps to run and it was starting to look as though Hayden would get the better of his foe.

But Pedrosa responded to the challenge and a new fastest lap of the race was his instant reply. Stoner's mistake under brakes on lap 15 had put him within reach of Tamada, Melandri, Capirossi and Gibernau and the young Australian was laying darkies everywhere in his struggle to stay ahead of the chasing horde.

Pedrosa took his first win in the premier class with a great ride to beat home Hayden while Edwards rounded out the podium a further 14 seconds behind. Hopkins brought his Suzuki home for fourth to make it three Americas in the top four. Without the time to do the research I would hazard a guess that three Americans in the top four hadn't happened since the days of Rainey, Schwantz and Lawson. While the fortunes of the Americans took a turn for the better in China, the Italians had one of there worst weekends on record with Melandri the first Italian home in seventh. That strange turn of events had also played out in qualifying where there was no Italian in the top seven places on the grid since the Grand Prix of Argentina in 1998.

Nicky Hayden may have had to have settled for second place but with Capirossi only managing eighth position, the kid from Kentucky extended his championship lead out to 13 points ahead of the Ducati man. Pedrosa's win moved him up to third place in the series ahead of Melandri and Stoner while Rossi's failure to finish pushed him back to sixth in the championship.

1st, Dani Pedrosa (Honda) :
"I was very focused on my job and was just trying to get best time every time, and we were just trying to increase the gap every lap. The weather respected us today it seemed, and this was very good for the race and for us. It’s fantastic, I started well this time and although it was hard I am delighted to have won my first race in MotoGP."

2nd, Nicky Hayden (Honda) :
"I always believed that I could run Dani down in the race and take the lead, but I have to give him credit. I tried to put the heat on him but he was just too quick. The team have done a job to be proud of, it’s always a bit of a gamble with the weather but they pulled it off. I want that win, I’ll try and do better next time, but second is still a good result."

3rd, Colin Edwards (Yamaha) :
"I’m relieved to be back on the podium. It's no secret that we’ve had our problems, we knew that we had difficulties yesterday even though we were on the front row. We worked backwards in Turkey to try and find a solution with the set-up. That first corner was a little bit scary, John Hopkins came underneath me, and I just left him to it and decided to go as fast as I could. The two frontrunners came through like a freight train I tried to keep up but there was nothing I could do."

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MotoGP Race

D. Pedrosa Honda ESP 44' 7.734
N. Hayden Honda USA +1.505
C. Edwards Yamaha USA +14.634
J. Hopkins Suzuki USA +19.265
C. Stoner Honda AUS +23.061
M. Tamada Honda JPN +23.879
M. Melandri Honda ITA +24.101
L. Capirossi Ducati ITA +24.467
S. Gibernau Ducati ESP +28.358
S. Nakano Kawasaki JPN +33.851
T. Elias Honda ESP +35.316
R. De Puniet Kawasaki FRA +52.004
K. Roberts Team Roberts KR USA +56.293
C. Checa Yamaha ESP +1' 3.575
A. Hofmann Ducati GER +1' 11.172
J. Ellison Yamaha GBR +1' 23.075
J. Cardoso Ducati ESP +1' 35.150

Fastest Race Lap

D. Pedrosa 1m59.318

Fastest Top Speed

M. Tamada 343.7kph (Qualifying)

MotoGP Championship

Nicky Hayden Honda USA 72
Loris Capirossi Ducati ITA 59
Daniel Pedrosa Honda ESP 57
Marco Melandri Honda ITA 54
Casey Stoner Honda AUS 52
Valentino Rossi Yamaha ITA 40
Toni Elias Honda ESP 37
Colin Edwards Yamaha USA 35
Shinya Nakano Kawasaki JPN 28
Sete Gibernau Ducati ESP 25
Makato Tamada Honda JPN 24
John Hopkins Suzuki USA 20
Kenny Roberts Team Roberts KR USA 20
Chris Vermeulen Suzuki AUS 13
Carlos Checa Yamaha ESP 10
James Ellison Yamaha GBR 3

Manufacturers Championship

Honda 90
Yamaha 59
Ducati 59
Suzuki 29
Kawasaki 28
Roberts 20