Second position for Pedrosa and third for Stoner, who was able to get on the podium despite suffering physical problems. A feisty Andrea Dovizioso, fifth.
The San Marino Grand Prix saw another intense chapter of episode in the fight of the MotoGP World Championship, where Dani Pedrosa and Casey Stoner showed again a very high level. Second and third, respectively, the Repsol Honda Team riders achieved another important podium that keeps the Australian at the top of the overall standings, with 35 points of advantage over Jorge Lorenzo, winner of today’s race. A round where Andrea Dovizioso fought until the very last corner to achieve the final fifth position.
At the start, Jorge Lorenzo took the initiative, with Casey Stoner at his wheel and Dani Pedrosa third, standing the pressure from Ben Spies, who tried to advance him in the second corner without success. Not only that, but before the end of the lap the American was overtaken by a feisty Andrea Dovizioso, confirming a good start in front of his home public.
As laps went by, Lorenzo, Stoner and Pedrosa built some margin over the rest, although from the fifth lap Pedrosa lost some ground. Casey Stoner was comfortably behind Lorenzo’s Yamaha until mid race, when he started to lose ground as he suffered some physical problems due to the terrible heat at the Misano track and to the lack of rest after the Indianapolis Grand Prix a week ago. After losing contact with Lorenzo, he could neither prevent Pedrosa from reducing the distance and, six laps before the end, the Spaniard was able to catch him and then overtake him.
After them, an intense battle was raging for fourth position, since Marco Simoncelli overtook Andrea Dovizioso in lap eight. In a group completed by Ben Spies and Rossi, the kept exchanging position until three laps from the end, when Dovizioso launched an attack and overtook Simoncelli. Hard braking and long skids followed until the Finish line, where finally Simoncelli got the fourth place and Dovizioso the fifth.
After two consecutive weeks competing in two different continents, now it is time for a well-deserved rest of a week and a half. The World Championship will resume —again in Spain— in a fortnight at the Motorland Aragón track, where Casey Stoner will arrive with a 35-point advantage over Jorge Lorenzo.
Dani Pedrosa >> Audio
2nd at 7.299 seg.
“I’m a little disappointed with the race because the bike didn’t feel as good as it was in practice. We wanted to make a change to the suspension to improve it a little but we had the opposite effect, sometimes it happens. From the first lap, I realised I couldn’t keep up with Jorge [Lorenzo] and Casey [Stoner], at the beginning the bike was closing the front and then it was sliding in the rear. The second part of the race was good, Jorge had a perfect race today, but I was able to improve my times lap by lap and catch Casey. I overtook him and maintained my rhythm to the finish with another second place in two weeks, which it’s not so bad. We’ve been lucky today as it was cooler than yesterday and finally the rain didn’t come. It’s been two very demanding races in a row and this one in particular was perhaps the toughest of the season so far, as the circuit is challenging with so many hard braking areas and it has been very hot again, also after Indy it has been difficult to recover from the jet lag and fatigue. Let’s hope we can get some rest and be stronger for Aragon”.
Andrea Dovizioso >> Audio
5th at 17.390 seg.
“It was a tough race, I had to push hard and ride aggressively and we had to cut the power a lot due to fuel consumption issues. We suffered from this during the whole race weekend, but after the warm up I received the bad news that we had to cut even more power. This hasn’t been such a big issue this year and in fact it has never been the case that I am unable to match Simoncelli in acceleration. This stems from the riding style and the set up of the electronics, especially the engine braking. I knew that with this cut in power it would have been impossible to fight for the podium, so this affected my motivation. We had a good battle with Marco and Spies, on this occasion, for the first time this season Marco [Simoncelli] beat me so congratulations to Marco. It was a good battle but our target was to gain some points on Lorenzo and we didn’t manage to. We are still third in the Championship which is the most important point, we are confident and will continue working”.
Casey Stoner >> Audio
3rd at 11.967
“At the beginning of the race I was cautious as there were a few spots of rain, once this cleared up I was pretty comfortable behind Jorge [Lorenzo], I didn’t feel the need to push and then the tiredness suddenly hit me. It was hard to find the braking points and change direction on the bike, there was nothing wrong with the tyres, nothing wrong with the bike, the team did a great job and gave me a fantastic package, I’m just worn out. After the past few races I’ve had to put in a lot more effort in Laguna and Brno, riding a lot harder than I normally would. This together with the neck injury from Assen which I’ve been struggling to get strong again due to lack of training from the hectic race calendar, has finally caught up with me. For the second half of the race I was just too tired, simple as that, I’m very grateful to have finished on the podium. All credit to Jorge, he had a fantastic race, hopefully by Aragon I’ll be fully fit and recovered”.
