Sixth pole position for Casey Stoner, second place for Dani Pedrosa and sixth for Andrea Dovizioso
Another step ahead for the Repsol riders in the MotoGP World Championship after the second day of practice at the German Grand Prix. In the all-important qualifying session, Casey Stoner and Dani Pedrosa achieved the two fastest times of the day, which will allow them to lead tomorrow’s starting grid, where their team mate at the Repsol Honda Team, Andrea Dovizioso, will start from the second row, with the sixth fastest time.
It was the sixth time this season that Stoner sets the fastest time in qualifying, showing again his good relationship with the Repsol Honda RC212V, even in a circuit as unusual as Sachsenring. The Repsol rider finished 27 laps keeping a very good pace in race configuration and, by the end of the session, he took another step ahead and set a time of 1 minute, 21 seconds y 681 thousandths, a register no other rider was able to improve.
252 thousandths behind that time finished Dani Pedrosa. Improving lap after lap following the recovery process of his right collarbone that was fractured in France, the Repsol rider showed why he has four victories on this track. Pedrosa did 54 laps (22 in the free session and 32 in the qualifying), completing nearly 200 kilometres that showed he has improved his feelings on the bike and allowed him to take a position in the first row of tomorrow’s starting grid.
A grid where Andrea Dovizioso will be in sixth position after setting a fastest time of 1 minute, 22 seconds and 157 thousandths, 476 behind the time set by Stoner. Dovizioso completed the morning’s free practice session in fifth place, but despite improving nearly three tenths from the morning and riding most of the qualifying in the top five did not allow him to improve his position in the final classification.
Dani Pedrosa >> Audio
FP3 – 1:22.153, 22 laps, 81 km.
QP – 1:21.933, 32 laps, 117 km.
“It’s great to be on the front row again, to be honest I didn’t expect it. But we’ve done a good job and it’s important to start in front here because the first corner is very tight and it’s better to avoid being immersed in the group at the start. For the race, we still need to improve the bike a little, so we will work on that with the mechanics this evening. It would be nice to have a little more traction. I think we will need to pay attention to Yamaha at the end of the race because the riding is smoother and they can save the tyres better. As for my condition, right now the races are physically hard for me, but it’s also true that with more left hand corners in this circuit I don’t suffer as in Mugello and I can concentrate on my riding. More than pain, I feel weak from lack of training, but we will give our maximum hoping to get a good result”.
Andrea Dovizioso >> Audio
FP3 – 1:22.441, 23 laps, 84 km.
QP – 1:22.157, 34 laps, 125 km.
“I’m confident for tomorrow as we have good pace but it will be a hard race as there are five or six of us very close to each other. Starting from the second row it will be important to have a good start and keep a constant rhythm without stressing the tyres too much as they get very hot here. In the first laps the right side of the tyre is difficult to get temperature into whilst the left side is stressed a lot so managing the tyres will be a crucial point for the race. We will work on the set up to fine tune the settings and I’m positive to fight for a good result tomorrow”.
Casey Stoner >> Audio
FP3 – 1:22.386, 21 laps, 77 km.
QP – 1:21.681, 27 laps, 99 km.
“After the crash on Friday my confidence was dented a little and we struggled to get enough data, so we’ve been playing catch up all day today. This morning we made a few small steps forward but not really enough, the guys in front of us were just consistently that little bit faster and we were finding it hard to match their pace. We completed a lot of laps on one tyre this morning, in fact over race distance on a tyre I did one of my fastest laps on so this was certainly positive. Then this afternoon we kept trying different directions on both bikes and every step we made on each bike, we took big steps forward so we’re pretty happy with the set up we have now. The lap times are very close here so it will be a tough race and hard to take any real advantage.
However, I’m very happy and positive we can still slightly improve tomorrow morning so thanks to all my team for a great job”.
