In searing heat, the thermometers marking around 40º and the asphalt at over 50º, the final day of practice once again brought good and bad tidings for the two riders in the Repsol Honda Team. The morning session was very fruitful and positive for both of them, with Andrea Dovizioso 2nd at the end, and Dani Pedrosa 4th n spite of his painful right leg. The Spanish rider had another pain-killing injection this morning before getting on his bike, and his progress throughout the session was notable.
After the result achieved in free practice the Repsol Honda Team pits expected a lot from this afternoon`s qualification session, and things went well at the beginning, with Dovizioso 2nd on the leaderboard and Pedrosa 5th after the first 10 minutes. At the halfway stage both sides of the Repsol Honda Team pits were continuing to test tyres and getting the set up right for tomorrow. When there were 20 minutes left Dovizioso and Pedrosa went out on a rear tyre with a softer compound, with the clear intention of fighting to get on the front row.
And whilst the Italian moved into third place on his first fast lap, the Spaniard did not improve on 8th. At the second attempt Dovizioso stayed in 3rd position, and Pedrosa once again could not improve on 8th. Right at the end Andrea fell back one position, and 4th place means he will be on the second row tomorrow.
On the other side of the pits luck was nowhere to be seen, on Pedrosa`s final attempt at a fastest lap he ended up on the floor after making a mistake when braking. He was well aware that he was losing time to his biggest rivals on the second section of the circuit, and so he tried to cut a few tenths off his time on corner four, but he braked too late. As he went into the gravel he saw that he was going too fast to avoid hitting the wall and so in the end he dropped the bike, unluckily he fell on his right side, the zone that was injured and given the pain-killing injection. In spite of this mishap the Repsol Honda Team rider will race tomorrow, he will be on the third row after setting the eighth best time.
Dani Pedrosa, 1’43.207 sec, 50 laps, 236 km. >> Audio
“I’m reasonably satisfied with my pace today, especially considering how things felt yesterday. We’ve qualified for the race and, although I’d have preferred to be on the front two rows, this position is OK. In fact, I think I could have been a row further forward had I not had the crash in the last few minutes of qualifying – that’s the period when the best times are usually set. I went into the corner a little bit too fast and wide and had to run straight on. Then I saw the air fence and decided it was best to get off the bike. This morning I had an injection for the pain which worked quite well so I didn’t have another one for the afternoon, though it was becoming more uncomfortable by then. Tomorrow I’ll have another injection and we’ll try to take the best result possible in the race. It’s going to be extra hard work because of the heat, but there are a lot of my fans out there so I’ll be riding my hardest for them”.
Andrea Dovizioso, 1’42.594, 53 laps, 250 km. >> Audio
“I’m very happy with this 4th position, even though of course my target was to be on the first row. I like this racetrack – you do a lot of sliding the bike and I really enjoy this kind of riding. We made progress with the machine this morning, then we made a modification to the setting this afternoon that didn’t have the results we expected, so tomorrow we will go back to this morning’s set up. Today it was very hot and conditions were very demanding for the tyres – all the riders seemed to have less grip at the rear. Still, I’m quite satisfied. We have improved our race pace and tomorrow I will fight hard for the podium. We were fast today and I think we can get closer to the frontrunners’ race pace in the low 1m 43s, although consistency is still their advantage”.
