PEDROSA SCORES HOME RACE POLE FOR HONDA

2010-05-01 10:24
Dani Pedrosa (Repsol Honda RC212V) produced a sublime display of riding at sun-drenched Jerez this afternoon to claim his first pole position of the year, ahead of fellow Spaniard Jorge Lorenzo (Yamaha). This was the 24-year-old’s 14th premier-class pole and his first at Jerez since 2007.

Pedrosa – who is making the most of a revised RCV chassis – has an enviable Jerez record to build on tomorrow. Since graduating to MotoGP in 2006 he has never finished lower than second here. Race winner in 2008, the former 125 and 250 World Champion was Jerez runner-up in 2006, 2007 and 2009. He also won the 250 GP here in 2005.

Pedrosa’s best lap – cheered all the way by a massive and patriotic crowd – was a stunning 0.285 seconds faster than the rest, an impressive advantage in modern-day MotoGP racing. But the next five riders were covered by just 0.104 seconds, suggesting that tomorrow’s second round of the 2010 MotoGP series should be a close and thrilling race.

Privateer Randy de Puniet (LCR Honda RC212V) rode another dazzling qualifying session to claim a second-row start at the tail end of that five-strong group, despite sliding off at Turn Ten this morning. The Frenchman – who finished fourth at Jerez last year – will be gunning for a podium tomorrow.

Andrea Dovizioso (Repsol Honda RC212V) had expected great things this afternoon after lapping within four tenths of the fastest time this morning. But in the quest for an even better pace, Dovi tried some modifications this afternoon which actually took him back a step. Nonetheless, while his grid position isn’t what he would have wanted, Dovizioso’s pace is fast enough for him to be in the hunt for a podium, so long as he gets away with the front-runners. His best lap was less than half a second off fourth-quickest Valentino Rossi (Yamaha).

Marco Melandri (San Carlo Honda Gresini RC212V) was a morale-boosting tenth fastest, sixth thousands of a second behind Dovizioso. Melandri’s performance indicates that he is starting to gel with his RC212V after a challenging start to the season in Qatar three weeks ago. He looked rejuvenated on the bike and may well have scored a better grid slot if he hadn’t made a minor error during the final sector during his best lap.

Hiroshi Aoyama (Interwetten Honda MotoGP RC212V) was second best rookie of the day in 12th place, just behind Loris Capirossi (Suzuki) who will start his 301st GP tomorrow. The reigning 250 World Champion continuing his intelligent, step-by-step progress of acclimatisation into MotoGP, improving today from 14th this morning to make the top dozen this afternoon.

Marco Simoncelli (San Carlo Honda Gresini RC212V) had another tough day, ending the hour-long session in 16th place, but the Italian rookie already proved in Qatar that he can find plenty more speed when it comes to the race.

Weather conditions for tomorrow are expected to be slightly cooler than today, which should add an interesting twist to today’s performances in both MotoGP and Moto2.

The new Honda-powered Moto2 World Championship produced a breathtakingly close qualifying session today; the fastest 20 riders separated by just 0.811 seconds! The pack was headed by Shoya Tomizawa (Technomag-CIP, Suter), the man who made history in Qatar by winning the inaugural Moto2 race. The 19-year-old Japanese rider set the fastest lap with 22 minutes to go, then slid off his Suter MMX machine two minutes later. Despite that hiccup, the 19-year-old held onto pole position by just two thousands of a second from reigning 125 World Champion Julian Simon (Mapfre Aspar Team, RSV).

Toni Elias (Gresini Racing Moto2, Moriwaki) made it two Spaniards on the front row by recording the third fastest time, a further five hundredths of a second behind his compatriot. Elias – winner of the 2003 250 GP here and Moto2 pole position man in Qatar three weeks ago – is still riding in some discomfort, suffering from a nasty left-hand injury he sustained during a hefty crash at Jerez during preseason testing.

Last man on the front row was Yuki Takahashi (Tech 3 Racing, Tech 3), who was less than three hundredths of a second behind Elias and only one hundredth in front of second-row leader Thomas Luthi (Interwetten Moriwaki Moto2, Moriwaki).


HONDA MotoGP RIDER QUOTES

Dani Pedrosa (Repsol Honda RC212V), pole position at 1m 39.202s, said: “It’s always nice to get pole position and especially here because it is my home race and the support from the fans is amazing, so I’m very happy for them. I really didn’t expect this pole to be honest, but I was pushing very hard so I’m very happy about it. Actually though, it’s not so significant for me because the important thing is the performance in the race and we still need to work very hard on this area. The new frame is delivering some improvements but we’re still not all the way there and we must continue to work on the stability because this is very important in order to be competitive over race distance. Our rivals are also showing a lot of potential so we can’t relax in any way because this will be a long, tough race. Obviously I will start the race thinking about the win, and I know there will be a lot of fans out there cheering for me so I hope we can give them something special.”

Randy de Puniet (LCR Honda RC212V), sixth at 1m 39.591s, said: “I am very happy because it has been a very good qualifying session. I am just eight hundredths off the front row and the adjustments we have made to the bike work well especially in race trim. This afternoon we concentrated to obtain the second row and we are delighted with this result as we are the first independent team on the grid for the second time after Qatar GP. My target is to keep this placement in tomorrow’s race to repeat the positive result we gained in Qatar, but I know it won’t be so easy.”

Andrea Dovizioso (Repsol Honda RC212V), ninth at 1m 40.021s, said: “I actually think we could have made it onto the second row today so I’m a little disappointed with the result this afternoon because it can be very important to start from the first two rows. We showed our full potential in the morning session where we were four tenths behind the fastest rider, so it’s a shame we couldn’t repeat that in qualifying. For the afternoon we made some adjustments to the electronics and machine set-up and this actually took us back a step, so tomorrow we will return to this morning’s set-up and I’m confident that will give us an improvement. Starting from the third row it will be important to make a good getaway and stay glued to the front riders because this is key to having a good race – as we saw in Qatar.”

Marco Melandri (San Carlo Honda Gresini RC212V), tenth at 1m 40.027s, said: “We had a great session today, setting an excellent race pace and I’m really confident about the race. We’re struggling a bit for rear grip but we’re working to improve and I think with a small step forward we can make a big improvement. It is a shame about the qualifying lap because I made a small mistake on my last effort and it cost me a lot of time in the final sector. Anyway, I think that with a good start we can have a fun race tomorrow. I’m happy because we’ve done a good job together, everybody in the team is highly motivated and I think we have created the right atmosphere to improve.”

Hiroshi Aoyama (Interwetten Honda MotoGP RC212V), 12th at 1m 40.322s, said: “My lap times in the qualifying session were not bad today, but the starting position for the race could have been better and therefore I am not 100 per cent satisfied. I am not happy that we are not closer to the front. In general we worked a lot on the setup and it worked out. Tomorrow we want to improve the setup in the warm-up and then I hope we will have a good race.”

Marco Simoncelli (San Carlo Honda Gresini RC212V), 16th at 1m 40.586s, said: “After this morning’s session I was hoping for better this afternoon but we’re still struggling a little and I can’t ride how I want. The reality is that we’re not that far off the top guys – 1.3 seconds isn’t a big gap but I am still in sixteenth. All we can do is try to improve a little more before tomorrow and then do our best to make up positions in the race.”


MOTO2 FRONT ROW QUOTES

Shoya Tomizawa (Technomag-CIP, Suter), pole position at 1m 44.372s, said: “I think I was a bit lucky today, because when I crashed I never thought it possible that I could get pole position. I crashed with 20 minutes of the session remaining. I really wanted to continue my time attack, so I managed to ride the bike back to the pit box, where my mechanics worked very hard to repair the bike. They did a great job, so my thanks to them, and I was able to go back out on the track. I wanted to check everything and test the setup once more because the chassis settings have not been perfect so far. We will think a lot this evening and try and find a solution to make the machine even better for the race. This class is very tough, so even though I am on pole position I would never say I will win this race because I am only two thousandths ahead of Simon. In fact I wouldn’t even say I will finish on the podium because all the lap times are so close.”

Julian Simon (Mapfre Aspar Team, RSV), second at 1m 44.374s, said: “This has not been an easy two days for us, because we started out with some revised chassis parts. We worked hard with them but in the end we decided to go back with the parts we used at Qatar and the bike was immediately much better. I hope we can have a good race here, because we were obviously very disappointed at Qatar when we had problems with the clutch after the start. The start tomorrow will be very important and Shoya will be very difficult to beat; he is very strong.”

Toni Elias (Gresini Racing Moto2, Moriwaki), third at 1m 44.424s, said: “We have struggled with setup here, so we will try some more changes for tomorrow in order to recover something for the race. The foot I injured in preseason testing is okay now, but I still have some problems with my left hand – I can’t put full pressure through the handlebars, which is a real problem when turning and making direction changes.”

Yuki Takahashi (Tech 3 Racing, Tech 3), fourth at 1m 44.463s, said: “We have done a good job here. The setup of my Tech 3 machine was good yesterday afternoon and we have worked hard from that initial setting to get a good race setup. After crashing in Qatar, I really want to score a good result for the team.”

Source: Honda Pro Image

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