Dani Pedrosa took his first pole position of 2009 season at this Saturday afternoon’s MotoGP qualifying session for the French GP. The Repsol Honda rider stole the pole position away from Jorge Lorenzo by five thousanth of second, all in the last 10 seconds of the qualifying session. Casey Stoner was third, fourth was Valentino Rossi, just in front of Andrea Dovizioso…all five of these riders were within three tenths of second of each other.
Going into Sunday’s race, it seemed for certain that a Spaniard would once again be on the podium at Jerez. Then The Doctor showed up with a lightning fast warm up time, that just eeked out Jorge Lorenzo’s. With the Italian interjecting himself on this previously Spanish only affair, the Spanish GP was shaping up to be a a blood sport exhibition for the 123,000 Spanish fans filling the grandstand. Continue reading on for a full race report from Jerez.
Bridgestone race tire manager Tohru Ubukata has issued an official apology to Dani Pedrosa and the Repsol Honda Team for the condition of Pedrosa’s front tire during the Japanese GP at Motegi. As you can see in the photo, Pedrosa came back into the pits after the race with chunks of rubber missing from the tire carcass. Bridgestone has promised to carry out a full investigation to find out why the tire was missing pieces at the the end of the Motegi GP.
According to Ubukata, no other riders or tires were affected with a similar malfunction, which makes this an unfortunate incident for Pedrosa:
“We did see some problems with Dani Pedrosa’s medium compound front Bridgestone tire after the race. All the other tires that were used during the weekend, and this season, performed well so we can say this is a problem isolated to just this one tire, but of course we have already taken the tire to our technical center in Tokyo where we are investigating the problem in detail.”
Pedrosa could very well owe his 3rd place finish to that tire malfunction, being unable to pass Rossi after several opportunities. Its a good thing the official track car of MotoGP isn’t a Ford Explorer.
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After being rained out yesterday, the Qatar GP, at the Losail International Circuit, finally got its green flag today. There was however a good omen to the start of the season, question mark riders Dani Pedrosa and Nicky Hayden made it onto the starting grid and finished a respectable result. We don’t want to give away anymore of the MotoGP season opener, so continue reading for all the spoilers.
Dani Pedrosa has confirmed that he will be racing at Qatar for the opener of the MotoGP season. Pedrosa has been sidelined since a crash while testing, which led to him needing surgery on his leg and arm. Speaking on his blog at repsol.com, the Spaniard announced that he had decided at the last minute to head to Losail, and to risk further injury by riding.
Dani Pedrosa was operated on by a team of doctors at the USP Institut Universitari Dexeus yesterday evening. The medical staff placed a titanium screw in Pedrosa’s left wrist and a skin graft on his left knee. The two doctors carried out both of the three-hour operation at the same time, with the left knee skin graft taking the most time. At the press conference the doctors spoke about each procedure and the likely recovery time.
“Dani Pedrosa received a graft on the open wound using a rotation graft, a graft of skin and fat taken from the inside of his left thigh to cover the affected area,” stated Dr. Ferreira. “We must now wait for scar tissue to form; the patient will be able to start moving a little within three weeks and within a minimum of four he can begin to bend the leg.”
“The fracture on the left distal radius, which was affecting the joint, has been repaired, it was then fixed with a titanium screw. The functioning of the affected zone will begin within ten days, in the meantime Dani Pedrosa will stay in hospital for the next 72 hours” said Dr. Mir.
With doctors saying that it will be four weeks before Pedrosa can even bend his knee, it is very likely that Dani will be unable to test at Jerez, which is in three weeks.
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The injury Dani Pedrosa suffered at Qatar is worse than at first thought. We reported earlier that Pedrosa had come away from the accident with only bruising and swelling, but after a closer examination it is now apparent that Dani has suffered a distal radius fracture, an injury which will require the fitting of a titanium screw to compress the fracture. He is scheduled to undergo surgery on Wednesday afternoon.
The 2009 season has started. Well…sort of. The champagne only stopped flowing moments ago for Valentino Rossi, but work for the 2009 season waits for no man. With more rider and team shakeups than the Sunday morning Times word search, the 2009 MotoGP teams (sans Tech3) have begun shaking out their new bikes, and for some, their new riders.
Read more after the jump.
Well that’s it folks, the MotoGP season is over. Not to spoil it, but Randy de Puniet was not the come-from-behind points winner for the rider’s cup. Click on the jump to see every dirty spoiler.