Marc Marquez, Jorge Lorenzo, Repsol Honda Team, Movistar Yamaha MotoGP, Indianapolis
Monday, August 31, 2015
Moto3 Action Indianapolis
Repsol Honda’s Marc Marquez ended Friday just 0.033s behind Lorenzo on the combined timesheets.
Marquez topped the morning FP1 session, and managed to improve his time by over seven-tenths in FP2. The Spaniard ended the day second overall, behind Lorenzo, and will be looking to work on his race setup on Saturday morning.
Marquez completed 33 laps throughout the day, and still clearly feels there is room for improvement.
Marc Marquez: “I'm happy with today, as things have gone quite well. It was a good day and we have made continuous positive development, improving our top lap time considerably from the first session to the second. The important thing is that I felt very comfortable and we are up at the top, competing at the same level as Jorge, who is very strong and riding with a lot of confidence. Our goal tomorrow will be to keep up the same way of working that we saw today and to further improve in any aspect where there is still room to do so. We will focus especially on setting up the bike for the race, because it will be a long one."
More:http://www.motogp.com/en/news/2015/08/28/marquez-i-felt-very-comfortable/182829
Valentino Rossi claims his fourth win of the season after a masterful ride in the wet, with Petrucci and Dovizioso completing the podium.
Movistar Yamaha’s Valentino Rossi produced a fearless ride in the rain to claim his first ever victory at Silverstone, and open up a 12-point lead in the MotoGP™ World Championship standings over his teammate Jorge Lorenzo.
Rossi had earlier topped the wet Warm Up session, and there was drama before the lights even went out at Silverstone as it was originally declared a dry race, but rain on the grid prompted every rider to return to the pits on their warm-up lap to swap for wets. This led to a red flag and a 30-minute delay to allow the teams and riders to safely re-form back on the grid with the race officially declared wet.
When the action started in anger, Rossi enjoyed a solid start, before moving his way up from 4th on the grid to take the lead on just the second lap. Rossi managed to pass his teammate and main title rival Lorenzo at Village corner, much to the delight of the 73,000 fans at the legendary Silverstone Circuit.
He then tried to break away at the front, with only Marc Marquez on the Repsol Honda able to stay with him. Lap after lap Rossi and Marquez pulled away at the front, opening up a gap of 7 seconds to the 3rd placed Petrucci by just the ninth lap. The 36-year-old Italian was setting a blistering pace in the dreadful conditions, and it proved too much for even Marquez. The reigning MotoGP™ World Champion crashed out on lap 13 at Copse Corner to effectively end any chance he had of defending his title. The Spaniard now trails Rossi by 77 points in the standings, with just 6 races remaining.
Without Marquez to push him, Rossi seemed to relax and at one point it seemed as if the chasing Ducati’s of Danilo Petrucci and Andrea Dovizioso would close him down towards the end of the race. Petrucci had reduced the gap to just 1.6s with two laps remaining, but Rossi got a signal from his pit board and upped the pace once more. The ‘Doctor’ went on to take the race win by 3.010s.
Octo Pramac Racing’s Danilo Petrucci delivered an incredible ride to secure his first ever MotoGP™ podium as the leading Satellite rider. The Italian, starting from 18th on the grid, rode through the pack superbly before getting involved in an excellent battle for second with Dovizioso on the factory Ducati Team GP15. Petrucci’s GP14 is known as a good bike to ride in the wet and he made sure that he secured his best ever MotoGP™ career result to the delight of his team.
Ducati Team’s Andrea Dovizioso (+4.117s) completed an all-Italian podium to equal his best result of the season in Assen. The former 125cc World Champion started from 12th on the grid but rode superbly in the tricky conditions to secure his 29th MotoGP™ Podium.
Rossi’s main title rival and teammate Jorge Lorenzo (+5.726s) had a frustrating race. The double MotoGP™ World Champion led into the first corner, but found himself dropping back through the field at an alarming rate. At one point Lorenzo was as low as sixth before he seemed to recover and fought back to cross the line in fourth, limiting the damage to his title chances.
Dani Pedrosa (+11.132s) on the second Repsol Honda battled hard throughout the race to secure fifth spot. The Spaniard was right in the mix for the podium during the race but started to drop back in the latter stages, eventually crossing the line over 5 seconds behind Lorenzo.
EG 0,0 Marc VDS’s Scott Redding (+25.467s) won the ‘Battle of the Brits’ as he pulled off the best result of his MotoGP™ career in front of his passionate home support. His compatriot Bradley Smith on the Monster Tech 3 Yamaha was a further second back, after he enjoyed a race long battle with his teammate Pol Espargaro, before the Spaniard crashed out at turn 3 on lap 14.
Andrea Iannone (Ducati Team) finished in eighth ahead of the Team Suzuki Ecstar GSX-RR of Aleix Espargaro in ninth. Aprilia Racing Team Gresini’s Alvaro Bautista secured the team's second top-ten finish on their return to the premier class.
Nicky Hayden (Aspar MotoGP Team) was the leading Open Honda in 12th ahead of the Avintia Racing duo of Hector Barbera and Mike Di Meglio, while his teammate Eugene Laverty crossed the line in 17th.
LCR Honda pair Cal Crutchlow and Jack Miller both enjoyed excellent starts to the race and found themselves battling for the final podium spot. Unfortunately Miller would take out his British teammate at Vale on the 3rd lap, with both men forced to retire. Stefan Bradl (Aprilia Racing Team Gresini) also crashed out of the race with 8 laps to go.
Check out the full MotoGP™ race results, and the latest MotoGP World Championship standings.
Up next is round 13 in the MotoGP™ World Championship, the Gran Premio TIM di San Marino e della Riviera di Rimini on 11th-13th September.
More:http://www.motogp.com/en/news/2015/08/31/rain-master-rossi-re-takes-championship-lead/183092
Crushing disappointment as Cal Crutchlow is taken out of the Octo British Grand Prix, his home race.
Rain on Sunday saw LCR Honda’s Cal Crutchlow fly cutting his way through the field and into podium contention in the early stages of the race. He was not alone though, teammate Jack Miller on the Open Honda was right behind. Unfortunately Miller made an overly ambitious move when battling with another rider, falling and taking Crutchlow down with him. Crutchlow sprinted to his bike and returned to the pits, swapping to his other machine. This bike was set up for the dry and despite having wet tyres fitted, Crutchlow was unable to make up any ground and soon fell.
This marks yet another year of bad luck for Crutchlow at his home race. The Brit seems to attract misfortune when at home, but he has not let it frustrate him nor does he bare a grudge against his teammate for the incident. With 74 points Crutchlow sits tenth in the MotoGP™ World Championship standings, but eighth is within reach with a strong end to the season. It was announced at the start of the British GP weekend that Crutchlow will remain with his LCR Honda team in 2016 allowing the Convetry rider to approach the end of the season fully focused.
Cal Crutchlow: “Obviously I’m really disappointed, we could have done a great race today, I thought I had the pace to be with the winner. I felt really comfortable this morning in the rain and I felt really comfortable in the race, but these things happen. Jack is young, he was near to the front in a MotoGP race and made an ambitious move. He made a mistake, he apologised and I have accepted his apology. I’ve done it before and I’m sure I will do it again - this is racing, but obviously I was very disappointed.”
“I came in and we changed the bike, but as soon as I went out of the pitlane I crashed immediately because it was a dry setting on that bike and there is a big, big difference. I was not really going to carry on too much as I was too far behind the leader at that point, but it was a good job by the LCR Honda team this weekend and I really appreciate all the fan support as they really helped us.”
More:http://www.motogp.com/en/news/2015/08/31/crutchlow-we-could-have-done-a-great-race-today/183386
Suzuki and Aleix Espargaro participate in their first wet race together at the Octo British Grand Prix.
Team Suzuki Ecstar continue their re-introduction to the MotoGP™ World Championship, participating in their first fully wet race since returning. The first corner proved difficult for Aleix Espargaro, he and his GSX-RR hit by Yonny Hernandez (Octo Pramac Racing) and forced wide. This caused Espargaro to lose contact with the riders ahead and the Spaniard heard strange noises from his bike soon after. Espargaro put both these factors to the back of his mind and focused on gaining lost ground.
Espargaro was able to salvage ninth at the close of the race, a strong debut for the GSX-RR in the wet. In 2014 at Aragon, Espargaro secured his first MotoGP™ podium in the wet conditions but he was unable to repeat the performance in Britain due to a rapidly degrading rear tyre, along with his early race problems. While many may have lamented the wet conditions, Espargaro and Suzuki were pleased as they were able to collect valuable data.
Aleix Espargaro: “After today's race I can't say I'm happy but I am satisfied. This morning during the warm-up we found a good solution in set-up, which gave me some confidence, and we were pretty ready for the rain. Unfortunately I was hit by another rider in the very first corner, this made me lose some time and positions and I had to recover. I felt some strange noises coming from the back of my machine but its overall performance was not bad, so I could recover some positions and be consistent with lap-times for nearly two-thirds of the race. Unfortunately the back tyre started to suffer a drop in performance and I had to give-up pushing hard. I had a pretty-good advantage on the rider behind and I decided that it was more important to finish the race and collect information. We have never raced in the rain so every single piece of data is crucial for us. It was not bad as a wet-race debut, we can work a lot on it; but overall I'm happy.”
Jorge Lorenzo misses out on battling for third at the Octo British Grand Prix as his visor fogs.
Sunday’s British GP was sent into a frenzy as rain fell during the last warm up lap before the race. The red flag was brought out on safety grounds and the race restarted with all MotoGP™ World Championship riders fitting wets. Jorge Lorenzo made a strong start to the race on his Movistar Yamaha M1, leading the race for the opening laps. Unfortunately for Lorenzo he didn’t have the pace to stay with teammate Valentino Rossi and Marc Marquez (Repsol Honda) and quickly lost contact with the duo. A near miss with Pol Espargaro (Monster Yamaha Tech 3) sent the 2015 title challenger further down the field.
Lorenzo focused and recovered, passing several riders in the closing laps. He was quickly closing down on the fight for second and it looked as though he may salvage a podium when his visor began to mist. Unable to see properly, Lorenzo was forced to ease off his pace and lost any chance of finishing in third. As a result Lorenzo slips to second in the MotoGP™ championship table and is now 12 points behind teammate Valentino Rossi. Misano will play host to the next round of the MotoGP™ World Championship, a circuit that Lorenzo has gone well at in the past but it is also Rossi’s home round and he won’t be easy to beat.
Jorge Lorenzo: “At the first start with the slicks the situation was very dangerous, so I was happy when it started raining more so we could start with the rain tyre. The feeling in the first three or four laps was good and I was riding well, but the other riders started going faster than me. Valentino and Marquez passed me and I was in third position losing time every lap. They had a better pace than me early on in the race and I couldn‘t do anything to follow them. Suddenly, when entering the chicane, I almost had a big crash with Espargarò who made a incomprehensible move and it was a miracle I stayed on the bike. I was upset, but luckily I remained on the track and I tried to stay in third position, but Petrucci, Dovizioso and Pedrosa passed me. I was able to move faster and was getting better and passed Dani. In the last laps I arrived at Dovizioso, who made some mistakes, but it started to get colder and raining more. I completely lost my vision, because the visor was foggy and had to slow down and lost a chance at the third place, which was a pity. In the rain I didn‘t have the same pace as Valentino and Marquez."
More:http://www.motogp.com/en/news/2015/08/31/lorenzo-i-almost-had-a-big-crash-with-espargaro/183364
Sunday, August 30, 2015
Sunday, August 23, 2015
Take an inside look at the track-side studio as they bring us live coverage of the Czech GP, filmed exclusively on GoPro cameras.
