MotoGP Round Three
By, Trevor Hedge
With no rain interruptions for the first time in season 2009 practice and qualifying produced few surprises. Only 2.32 seconds covered the 18 strong field with Fiat Yamaha’s Jorge Lorenzo leading the way and Ducati’s Niccolo Canepa bringing up the rear. Also on the front row were Dani Pedrosa (Honda) and Casey Stoner (Ducati). Valentino Rossi (Yamaha) headed the second row ahead of Randy De Puniet (Honda) and Loris Capirossi (Suzuki). Four different manufacturers represented on the first two rows which nationality wise included two Spaniards, two Italians, a Frenchman and an Australian.
Dani Pedrosa scored the holeshot in front of 123,000 home fans at Jerez from Casey Stoner, Jorge Lorenzo, Valentino Rossi and Randy De Puniet.
As the opening lap wore on Pedrosa and Stoner managed to stretch away to the tune of a couple of bike lengths from Lorenzo.
Rossi put a beautiful move on Lorenzo to take third place halfway through the second lap and put his head down to ensure Pedrosa and Stoner could not pull away.
Pedrosa was on a mission with a new lap record on the second lap as Stoner tried to stick on his tail. Pedrosa’s Repsol Honda teammate was making advances on De Puniet’s fifth place, a passing attempt on lap three nearly ended with both of them on the deck but luckily both men emerged unscathed.
Rossi had the hammer down in response to Pedrosa’s pace and was reeling in Stoner, re-setting the lap record once again on the way. His Fiat Yamaha teammate however was losing touch with the leading trio and starting to struggle for pace.
Rossi took second place from Stoner late on lap five. The Ducati man knew Rossi was coming and let him through before the straight while tightening his line for a better exit which enabled him to take that second place back again under brakes at the end of the chute.
Rossi repeated the move on the next lap but this time around managed to keep Stoner at bay into the next turn and over the course of the next lap.
Fifth place challenger Dovizioso related himself to 16th place with a sojourn off the circuit all of his own doing. The Repsol man rejoining the circuit in the midst of a tough battle for 13th place with Toseland, Kallio and De Angelis the other protagonists. Nicky Hayden’s nightmare start to season 2009 was continuing with the Ducati Marlboro man languishing in an unflattering 17th place with 17 laps to run. The man whose place he had taken at Ducati was continuing to surprise on the Kawasaki, Marco Melandri a brilliant sixth place.
At the front it was still Pedrosa with around a second on Rossi while Stoner had started to lose touch with that duo to the tune of a couple of seconds. The buffer back to Lorenzo in fourth place had been double that margin but as the race approached the halfway point Lorenzo had started to pull some time out of Stoner and had managed to get the gap below three seconds for the first time since the opening laps.
With 12 laps to run Rossi had reduced Pedrosa’s lead to a slender half a second. Game on…
With 10 laps to run Rossi took the lead from Pedrosa. The leading duo had a full four seconds on Stoner while the Ducati man’s buffer back to Lorenzo had shrunk to only two seconds.
Rossi pulled away from Pedrosa and looked to have the win in the bag. The final rung on the podium however looked far from settled with Lorenzo continuing to close on Stoner as the race progressed. With six laps to run only 1.2 separated the pair.
With four laps to run Lorenzo had the gap down to 8-tenths but then lost the front through a right hander while in hot pursuit of Stoner. The Spaniard remounted and rejoined the tarmac but with a missing footpeg was left to limp his Yamaha back to the pits. A cruel blow for the youngster. Stoner’s pit-board informed him of the Lorenzo’s demise and the Ducati man buttoned off to ensure his podium finish.
Rossi got the last lap board with a clear 3.4 second buffer over Pedrosa. The gap back to Stoner in third place even larger.
Rossi celebrated the flawless win with a nice mono but was clearly out-done in the wheelie stakes by Stoner, the Ducati man pulling a beautiful stand-up minger the full length of the main straight. A feat replicated by a happy Randy De Puniet in fourth place. Rossi left his post race machinations to the cool down lap with a repeat of his infamous portaloo stop before riding back to pitlane side-saddle amidst the traditional Jerez firecracker craziness and cacophony of air horns.
After his disastrous 2007 season Melandri’s fifth place would have seemed almost as good as a win. A great way to mark the Italian’s 100th premier class Grand Prix. Melandri’s fifth place finish equals the best result Anthony West managed to claim on the Kawasaki, the Australian fifth at Brno last year.
Loris Capirossi edged Colin Edwards out of sixth place while Dovizioso recovered from his early off-track excursion to salvage eighth place. Toni Elias ninth and Chris Vermeulen rounded out the top ten ahead of Sete Gibernau.
The only Japanese rider in the field, Yuki Takahashi brought home 12th place for his Scot Honda squad with a two second buffer over James Toseland. The Briton was sixth at Jerez last year in only his second race on a MotoGP machine but this year things certainly not going as well for Toseland.
Rossi’s first win of season 2009 promoted him into the championship lead with 65 points. The occasion marked Rossi’s 64th podium since joining Yamaha in 2004 and the Yamaha brand’s 501st podium in the premier class of GP racing. Rossi only needs one more podium to equal the record number of premier class podiums scored for Yamaha by Wayne Rainey. It was also Rossi’s 12th podium finish in succession, his best run since 2005.
Stoner’s first ever Podium (in any class) at Jerez helped him into second place on 54 points while Pedrosa and Lorenzo are level pegging at 41 points apiece.
MotoGP next reconvenes in France at Le Mans on May 17.
Pictorial – Gallery A
| MotoGP Rnd 1 – Race Result | MotoGP Rnd 1 – Championship Standings |
NOT CLASSIFIED
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1. Valentino Rossi (ITA) Fiat Yamaha Team 65 2. Casey Stoner (AUS) Ducati Marlboro Team 54 3. Jorge Lorenzo (SPA) Fiat Yamaha Team 41 4. Dani Pedrosa (SPA) Repsol Honda 41 5. Andrea Dovizioso (ITA) Repsol Honda 30 6. Colin Edwards (USA) Monster Yamaha Tech 3 26 7. Randy De Puniet (FRA) LCR Honda MotoGP 24 8. Marco Melandri (ITA) Hayate Racing Team 23 9. Chris Vermeulen (AUS) Rizla Suzuki MotoGP 21 10. Loris Capirossi (ITA) Rizla Suzuki MotoGP 19 11. Mika Kallio (FIN) Pramac Racing 16 12. Toni Elias (SPA) San Carlo Honda Gresini 15 13. Alex De Angelis (RSM) San Carlo Honda Gresini 14 14. James Toseland (GBR) Monster Yamaha Tech 3 9 15. Sete Gibernau (SPA) Grupo Francisco Hernando 8 16. Nicky Hayden (USA) Ducati Marlboro Team 4 17. Yuki Takahashi (JPN) Scot Racing Team 4 18. Niccolo Canepa (ITA) Pramac Racing 2 |
| — MotoGP Quotes
1st – Valentino Rossi – “This is a wonderful victory because yesterday we were really quite worried! I couldn’t ride how I wanted to and it was very hard. We had to work all together to understand how to fix the problem and finally we made a big change to try to make the bike feel how I like in the corner, which worked, so I have to say a huge thank you to Jeremy and all my guys. This morning we could tell immediately that things were much better and then we made a couple more small changes after warm-up, which made my M1 and my Bridgestone tyres feel even better. The race was long and quite hard – I lost some time getting past Lorenzo at the start and then I had a good battle with Stoner, which I enjoyed. After that I wasn’t so fast and I couldn’t close the gap to Pedrosa for a while; he was very quick but finally things improved and I was able to catch and pass him. It’s great to win again and especially here in Jerez, which I love. It’s ten years since I made the joke with the toilet here and so I thought it would be funny to do it again if I won – I liked that a lot! Now I hope that the changes we’ve made here will help us for the rest of the season. Thanks again to everyone!” 2nd – Dani Pedrosa – “I really wanted to win here but I knew it was going to be tough because Valentino has been very strong through the weekend and I knew he’d be fast in the race – and that’s how it turned out. I got a good start, got out in front and then I just tried to concentrate on my race and see what would happen. Although of course I wanted to win here for me, the team and the fans, I’m actually very happy with the podium and surprised too. We struggled when we arrived on Friday and having missed so much testing in the winter – and the test here – It’s a very good result for us, so I must say thanks to my team and everyone who’s working with me. We’re having quite a difficult time at the moment to get the machine performance to where we want it, so this podium is unbelievable.” 3rd – Casey Stoner – “After all these years this is my first time on the podium at Jerez so it has been a long time coming – I’ve had plenty of opportunities in the past but I’ve been unlucky and made mistakes, so this tastes really sweet. Today I wasn’t nervous about the race at all because to be honest I went into it thinking that I didn’t have a chance of finishing on the podium. We knew Dani, Valentino and Jorge all had a better pace than us so we took a bit of a gamble with the setting to try and find an extra edge and it paid off, so I have to thank the team for that. I got a great start and I was running right up there with Dani in the early stages but I started to lose the front in a few corners. When Valentino came I tried to hold him off as best as I could but when he came past me the second time I decided to try and stay behind him, to see if he could take me with him to Dani. Unfortunately from that point I was losing the front even more often and there was one place in particular where I was almost crashing every lap. When Jorge started to close in I honestly thought it was ‘game over’ but I kept pushing to try and at least take the battle to the final laps. It was just getting to the point where I was going to have to back off because I was risking a crash, but Jorge solved that problem for me! I couldn’t believe my luck but I think we deserved it though because the whole team has worked incredibly hard all weekend and I could not have given more in the race. It is only third place but it feels even better than the win in Qatar.” 4th – Randy de Puniet – “It was a perfect weekend for me and the team, so my thanks to them. When I enjoy the bike I can really go fast, and people could see that today. The bike was very easy to ride and I had fun. I made a good start and when Dovizioso overtook me I remained concentrated to try and keep my position. After a few laps he made a mistake and I got back into fifth place. Then at the end I finished in fourth place. I am very satisfied with the work we did this weekend, because we struggled here during preseason testing. Honestly, I think if we can keep this pace for the rest of the season we can be really competitive. However, we must keep our feet on the ground because we restart from zero at Le Mans. My goal is to finish all the races and get as many points as possible.” 6th – Loris Capirossi – “I am a bit upset with the result, because we had a problem with the tyre and had to change it on the grid and that cost us some places at the start. We put in a new one and for the first two laps it did not work as well as I would have liked. After it settled down I pushed hard and chased Marco and Colin and tried get past them. I did that but the grip dropped off pretty quickly and they went back past me, so I played about with the traction control to find the best solution. I found a good setting and although I was fighting a lot with the bike I was able to stay with the two of them. In the last three laps I tried to overtake and I got past Colin and went by Marco, but I braked too late and ran wide and they both went back past me. On the last lap I overtook Colin again, but there wasn’t enough time to get Marco. We want to go much better than this, but we have to work harder, because although the bike is not too bad we have to take some big steps!” 8th – Andrea Dovizioso – “I didn’t make a great start but I was able to recover some places and I’m pretty sure I could have stayed with Lorenzo if I hadn’t made the mistake. On the eighth lap while I was in fifth position I lost the rear entering turn eight and I almost crashed. Fortunately I was able to rejoin the race and started to climb back up from 16th to eighth position. I wasn’t as fast as I wanted today because we’re still not at 100 per cent with the set-up of the bike. I’m disappointed about today’s result because we didn’t get the best out of the bike today. Dani had a great race today and I think he’s getting the maximum possible from the package, so I want to say congratulations to him.” 9th – Toni Elias – “I honestly thought we were capable of a better race today but it was impossible. We were suffering too much throughout the race with a lack of rear traction and I can promise the fans that I couldn’t do any more than what I did. In a situation like this you can only try to take some positives away from the Grand Prix as a whole and looking back at the weekend we have at least continued to make progress. We were two seconds off the pace in Qatar, one and a half seconds off in Motegi and one second off here. The target for Le Mans is to reduce it to less than a second. I hope we can do it.” 10th – Chris Vermeulen – “I got a reasonable start off the line, but I came together with a couple of other riders in turn one and lost my momentum. It was a bit difficult as I had a couple of Ducatis around me and with their straight-line speed they were a bit hard to get past. Once I got by I thought I would be able to pick up my lap-time, but we struggled with front grip and I wasn’t able to. The track temperature was a few degrees hotter today and it seemed to affect us more than it did some others and we have to work out why. I am disappointed with 10th because obviously the goal was to be nearer the front. We will now re-group and get to work on the next race.” 12th – Yuki Takahashi – “I’m satisfied with that result. I had a good feeling with the bike – the best since the beginning of the season. I made a good start and rode a fast first lap. Then I overtook Elias and found myself in a good position, but in the second half of the race I began to experience some problems with the tyres – first with the front, then with the rear. Anyway, I’m really happy: my programme is to learn race by race, at that is what I’m doing.” 14th – Alex De Angelis – “I woke up this morning with a bout of ‘flu and I was really struggling. Doctor Costa sorted me out with some medication but I certainly wasn’t at 100 per cent for the race. I got a decent start but I got stuck behind Toseland and even though I felt much faster than him he was very, very strong on the brakes and I just couldn’t get past. I got stuck there for the whole race and that was that, pretty much. There’s not much else to say! It has been one of my hardest weekends for a long time and I’m looking forward to spending some time at home, recovering from this illness and having a good rest before France, which promises to be another tough one for us.” 15th – Nicky Hayden – “I was nervous that physically it would be a tough race but it turned out to be a lot worse than we expected. In the beginning I struggled a lot again with a full fuel load and I made a mistake on the first lap – I was trying to make some positions up and I actually lost some. I tried to recover but something was wrong with the set-up of the bike. I can’t make the harder compound work well with my bike and I have to go with the softer one but today even those didn’t start to work well until I got a lot of heat into them. I did my best time on the seventeenth lap so there is something we have definitely to work on with the team. We need to look at the data and think up something different for the next one.” DNF – Jorge Lorenzo – “I am very sad, because I was so fast all weekend and on pole position. Unfortunately today the temperature meant that our setting did not work in the same way and at the moment we don’t understand why. This is really more disappointing than the actual crash. Fourth position wouldn’t have been so bad but when you’re in front of your fans, at home with so much adrenalin on the bike of course you try to do the maximum. I could see that the podium was possible and maybe the right thing would have been to go more gently and not push so hard in that moment, but I always want to do my best. Then I made a mistake and I threw all my good work away. We have to try to forget this and wake up feeling positive tomorrow because Le Mans is near. I’m sorry to all the fans who came to see me, to my team, family and to everybody!” — Bridgestone Report – Tyre compounds available: Front: Medium, Hard. Rear: Soft, Medium Valentino Rossi scored his first victory of the 2009 season from fourth on the grid for Fiat Yamaha after overcoming Dani Pedrosa’s 1.4 second advantage to pass the Spaniard by lap 18 of the 27 lap race. With all of the riders choosing to race on Bridgestone’s hard front tyre and only three using the softer of the rear slick options, round three of the MotoGP season delivered the third different winner in as many races. The hard compound front and medium compound rear Bridgestones were clearly the favoured combination given the track temperature and the more abrasive nature of the resurfaced tarmac. Only Ducati Team’s Nicky Hayden and the Pramac Racing pairing of Niccolo Canepa and Mika Kallio, the latter retiring with rear brake troubles, opted for the soft rear Bridgestone in an effort to better match the characteristics of their bikes. In front of his home crowd, Repsol Honda’s Pedrosa led for most of the race until overhauled by Rossi, and Ducati Team’s Casey Stoner finished third to claim his first podium at Jerez. Randy de Puniet claimed fourth on his satellite LCR Honda machine after polesitter Jorge Lorenzo fell four laps from the end, and in fifth was Marco Melandri who gave another strong performance for the Hayate Racing team. Hiroshi Yamada – Bridgestone Motorsport – Manager Motorcycle Sport Unit Tohru Ubukata – Bridgestone Motorsport – Manager, Motorcycle Race Tyre Development — 250cc Race There was a brilliant battle between four riders at the front of the 250cc race, with Scot Racing team’s Hiroshi Aoyama ultimately emerging on top, holding off the advances of Álvaro Bautista right at the death. The lead changed hands continuously throughout the race between Aoyama, Bautista and Metis Gilera’s World Champion Marco Simoncelli – the Italian falling away slightly in the final laps to eventually come home third. Aoyama outfought Bautista on the very last corner, the Japanese rider beating the Spaniard in his home race just as the Aprilia man had done to the Honda equipped Aoyama last week at Motegi. Aoyama now holds the championship lead by four points from Mapfre Aspar rider Bautista. As the front four crossed the line within three seconds of each other, Simoncelli completed the podium ahead of fourth placed Héctor Barberá (Pepe World Team Aprilia), the Italian finishing 0.063s ahead of the Spaniard. A close battle for fifth place was won by Thomas Luthi (Emmi – Caffe Latte) who beat Mattia Pasini (Team Toth Aprilia) to the line by 0.004s. 250 rider quotes — 125cc Race Bancaja Aspar’s team Bradley Smith earned his first ever win on the 50th time of asking in the 125cc class. There was heartbreak for poleman and home rider Julián Simón who suffered a nasty highside on lap five when running in second place and an accident on the first lap for series leader Andrea Iannone (Ongetta Team I.S.P.A) meant Smith went unchallenged en route to victory. Behind Smith there was a superb race-long battle for the podium with his team-mate Sergio Gadea eventually edging out Marc Márquez (Red Bull KTM) to make it a great day for the Spanish team and for those two Spanish riders in front of the home fans. The top five comprised only British and Spanish names in fact as Scott Redding (Blusens Aprilia) and Efrén Vázquez (Derbi Racing Team) crossed the line fractionally behind Gadea and Márquez. The World Championship returns to action at the Grand Prix de France in a fortnight’s time. |
| 250cc Race Result | 250cc Championship Standings |
| 1 / Hiroshi AOYAMA / JPN / Scot Racing Team 250cc / HONDA 2 / Alvaro BAUTISTA / SPA / Mapfre Aspar Team / APRILIA / 0.132 3 / Marco SIMONCELLI / ITA / Metis Gilera / GILERA / 2.706 4 / Hector BARBERA / SPA / Pepe World Team / APRILIA / 2.769 5 / Thomas LUTHI / SWI / Emmi – Caffe Latte / APRILIA / 17.946 6 / Mattia PASINI / ITA / Team Toth Aprilia / APRILIA / 17.950 7 / Gabor TALMACSI / HUN / Balatonring Team / APRILIA / 26.288 8 / Jules CLUZEL / FRA / Matteoni Racing / APRILIA / 26.472 9 / Roberto LOCATELLI / ITA / Metis Gilera / GILERA / 27.646 10 / Raffaele DE ROSA / ITA / Scot Racing 250cc / HONDA / 32.369 11 / Mike DI MEGLIO / FRA / Mapfre Aspar 250cc / APRILIA / 32.617 12 / Shoya TOMIZAWA / JPN / CIP Moto – GP250 / HONDA / 34.241 13 / Lukas PESEK / CZE / Auto Kelly – CP / APRILIA / 36.889 14 / Hector FAUBEL / SPA / Valencia CF / HONDA / 37.237 15 / Ratthapark WILAIROT / THA / Thai PTT SAG / HONDA / 1’16.786 |
1 AOYAMA 58, 2 BAUTISTA 54, 3 BARBERA 43, 4 LUTHI 29, 5 CLUZEL 28, 6 TALMACSI 28, 7 PASINI 26, 8 DI MEGLIO 21, 9 DE ROSA 21, 10 SIMONCELLI 16, 11 PESEK 15, 12 LOCATELLI 14, 13 TOMIZAWA 14, 14 DEBON 13, 15 S.AOYAMA 10. |
| 125cc Race Result | 125cc Championship Standings |
| 1 / Bradley SMITH / GBR / Bancaja Aspar Team 125cc / APRILIA 2 / Sergio GADEA / SPA / Bancaja Aspar Team 125cc / APRILIA / 13.524 3 / Marc MARQUEZ / SPA / Red Bull KTM Motosport / KTM / 13.553 4 / Scott REDDING / GBR / Blusens Aprilia / APRILIA / 14.251 5 / Efren VAZQUEZ / SPA / Derbi Racing Team / DERBI / 14.758 6 / Sandro CORTESE / GER / Ajo Interwetten / DERBI / 15.545 7 / Pol ESPARGARO / SPA / Derbi Racing Team / DERBI / 15.556 8 / Danny WEBB / GBR / Degraaf Grand Prix / APRILIA / 17.772 9 / Dominique AEGERTER / SWI / Ajo Interwetten / DERBI / 18.960 10 / Nicolas TEROL / SPA / Jack & Jones Team / APRILIA / 19.053 11 / Joan OLIVE / SPA / Derbi Racing Team / DERBI / 32.480 12 / Esteve RABAT / SPA / Blusens Aprilia / APRILIA / 32.554 13 / Johann ZARCO / FRA / WTR San Marino Team / APRILIA / 33.378 14 / Simone CORSI / ITA / Jack & Jones Team / APRILIA / 41.533 15 / Cameron BEAUBIER / USA / Red Bull KTM Motosport / KTM / 44.443
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1 IANNONE 37.5, 2 SMITH 36.5, 3 ESPARGARO 31.5, 4 SIMON 30, 5 CORTESE 28, 6 MARQUEZ 27, 7 GADEA 22, 8 BRADL 17, 9 WEBB 16.5, 10 AEGERTER 16.5, 11 REDDING 14.5, 12 OLIVE 14, 13 FOLGER 13, 14 VAZQUEZ 11, 15 TEROL 10.5. |
Red Bull Rookies – Race One
A second chance and Fagerhaug wins thriller.
A rather too sensational start to the 2009 Red Bull MotoGP Rookies Cup season saw Sturla Fagerhaug claim victory even though he crashed heavily and was half a lap behind the leading pack. The 17 year old Norwegian benefited from a restart following a 2 rider crash and pulled through to win an incredible 6 lap race 2 ahead of Mathew Scholtz and Danny Kent.
It was 16 year old South African Scholtz who rocketed away from the initial start into a 5 second lead only to run off the track when the extremely blustery wind took his front wheel away. He regained the track to cross the line 8th as the race was stopped. Featuring strongly in the first race and thus lining up for the restart in 2nd place the 15 year old Briton Kent was in the hunt for the win again after the restart.
Fagerhaug lined up at the back of the grid but with Scholtz unable to make the break-away that he did first time the battle that the South African had with 16 year old Frenchman Nelson Major and the rest of a 10 man lead pack slowed the race pace. That was all the help that Fagerhaug needed and he charged through.
Outbraking 2 or 3 riders a time into some corners Fagerhaug was unstoppable and finally stole the lead on the last lap. “When I crashed in the first day I thought it was going to be the worst day of my life. I couldn’t believe it when the race was restarted but you never want to see anyone get hurt so none of us were happy about it.”
“I’d made such a mess of the first start when I let out the clutch and the rear tyre slid sideways I just made sure I didn’t do it again. I was determined to get some good points and I saw the pack was not getting away. I started to realise that I really could get a good result but I never thought of winning it until the last lap when I saw I could do it,” concluded Fagerhaug.
It was the nasty fall of 15 year old Briton Harry Stafford that stopped the first race. He was right in the battle for the lead when the bike slid suddenly and highsided him right in front of the following pack, the front wheel of Florian Marino’s bike clipped the fallen rider and the 15 year old Frenchman also went down. Marino walked away but Stafford was taken by ambulance to hospital with a broken collarbone and severe concussion.
Scholtz had good reason not to try and repeat his attempted run-away in the restarted race. “The wind got under my bike and pushed the front wheel away in the first race. It was even worse after the restart and I had to make sure it didn’t happen again. I couldn’t believe it when Sturla caught us. One minute I looked behind and Danny was there then suddenly on the last lap… it was Sturla.”
Scholtz actually thought that the board said it was the second to last lap as did Kent. “I thought there was another lap to go,” said the Briton. “Still it was a great race and I’ll just have to see if I can go and win the race tomorrow.”
Fourth man home and strongly featuring throughout the two races was 14 year old Swede Alex Kristiansson. “I enjoyed myself so much, I really had fun. I wanted to get on the podium but it didn’t work out on the last lap, I’ll have to do it tomorrow.”
Similarly hoping for a better result in Sunday’s race, pole man Daijiro Hiura ended Saturday with no points as he crashed after pulling through to second following a mediocre start in the first race. “The wind was so hard, it just took my front wheel away,” explained the 14 year old Japanese who was unable to restart because of the damage to his KTM RC125.
Red Bull Rookies – Race Two
MotoGP Rookies Cup race at Jerez on Sunday. The blustery Spanish wind still contributed to a number of falls but this time Daijiro Hiura learnt from Saturday’s error and came home third ahead of Florian Marino.
Kent, the 15 year old Briton, explained how the wind effected him; “Every time I got in front the wind just pushed me back, it was so much easier to stay in the slipstream. There was no real way to break away. I wasn’t going to make the same mistake as yesterday so I kept counting down the laps as I crossed the line and went for it on the last lap, it wasn’t an easy move, I was determined, it was ‘win it or bin it.'”
Passed by Kent in the classic Jerez last-corner braking move Fagerhaug tried still to win. “I wasn’t surprised that Danny came past there, I thought I could pull it back on the inside and drive past on the way out but I was just a bit too close and had to back off slightly or hit his back wheel … that was it. Still a win and a second is not too bad from the weekend, it could have been a lot worse.”
Hiura did not make a great start from pole position and was back in 5th at the end of the first lap. Though the 15 year old Japanese was always in the lead pack he just wasn’t close enough over the last few laps to challenge Fagerhaug and Kent when it counted. “It was very windy again, difficult, a lot of riders all trying to pass all the time. I am happy to get some points but I want to win in Mugello.”
Fourth man home was 15 year old Frenchman Marino and not happy to have missed out on the podium. His was a fantastic performance though, having been at the hospital at midnight before the race following his Saturday crash. Seemingly unhurt in the fall he had later felt sick and was only cleared to race after a precautionary hospital check. “I really should have been able to be in the first three at least but some of the other guys are just not clever in the way they overtake, too many times they came inside almost out of control and we’d both go wide, you lose too much time like that, it doesn’t make sense.”
7th place finisher Mathew Scholtz, the 16 year old South African, echoed Marino’s feelings. “I wanted to get away with Sturla and Danny but then Daijiro came passed and then Pardo who just pushed me wide, it was a bit crazy and I went from 3rd to 7th in a couple of laps. I’ve got a gouge in my knee slider from someone’s front wheel, that’s a bit too close.”
Not all the heroes of the race finished, yet could still be satisfied with their first weekend as Red Bull Rookies. Following his excellent 4th place finish on Saturday, Alex Kristiansson, the 15 year old Swede, stormed through to lead the first lap on Sunday. He was solidly in the battle for a place on the rostrum until he slid off on lap 5. “The wind just got under the bike and I couldn’t catch it. I was just going the same speed, doing the same thing as I did the lap before but it caught me out. I think also the rubber from the MotoGP race might have made the track a little more slippery in some places.”
Someone with even less experience on a road racer is 13 year old Australian speedway rider Arthur Sissis. He was in the thick of the hard fighting front group when he slid off going for sixth place on lap 11. “I braked late to get past one of the Italians (Pardo) and just lost the front. I was enjoying it up to then. My knee wasn’t causing me any trouble but then I tore the stitches I had after yesterday’s crash and it was bleeding quite a bit, but that’s OK.”
Thankfully the injury list was not lengthened by Sunday’s falls and everyone was buoyed by the good news from Harry Stafford. The 15 year old Briton was knocked unconscious in Saturday’s nasty crash but quite soon after the doctors became optimistic as he steadily improved. Taken to Cadiz hospital for a complete scan he fully regained consciousness and the doctors are confident he will make a complete recovery. He is due to be released from hospital on Wednesday or Thursday and will have a medical flight back to Britain where he should complete his recovery at home. He also broke his right collarbone. Considering his serious concussion he is not expected to race again for a couple of months.
