MotoGP
Malaysian GP: Marco Melandri takes hard fought second
22 ottobre 2007 In searing heat under tropical sun Casey Stoner (Ducati) recorded his tenth win of the season, hounded all the way by Marco Melandri (Gresini Honda RC212V) who finished a brave second with Dani Pedrosa (Repsol Honda RC212V) third. These 21-laps of this 5.548km Sepang track were extremely hard work for riders and despite the tough conditions no one fell, although Nicky Hayden (Repsol Honda RC212V) had to take to the run-off when he overcooked his entry to the final turn on lap 12. Stoner made a rapid getaway from the lights and led Dani into turn one, these two closely followed by Marco Melandri and Randy de Puniet (Kawasaki). Both Stoner and Pedrosa made errors at the final turn on the opening lap, but the pair stayed on and stayed at the head of the pack. As the field settled down, the top four were covered by just one second by lap seven and this looked as if it might be a very tight race – so it proved to be, Melandri making strenuous efforts to get on terms with Dani as he kept the pressure on Stoner. Stoner was doing everything he could to shed his pursuers and on lap nine he recorded an early fastest lap of the race with a 2m 02.309s effort. Rossi was holding fifth but he was 3.2 seconds adrift of the leading four-rider group. As mid-race distance drew close Stoner had carved out a 1.5 second lead as Melandri successfully challenged Dani for second. Nicky meanwhile had survived his off-track moment but had dropped from seventh to tenth place. Stoner kept a rapid pace at the front recording another fastest lap of the race at 2m 02.108s as De Puniet closed on Pedrosa for third place. The Aussie Ducati man confessed to making a few errors in this race but he never let his lead slip to more than a second, and his 1.7 second margin at the flag was comfortable enough. Toni Elias (Gresini Honda RC212V) finished in sixth place but he was more than 17 seconds off the winner’s pace, while Nicky brought his RC212V home in ninth spot. Carlos Checa (LCR Honda RC212V) was 14th, Shinya Nakano (Konica Minolta Honda RC212V) 16th and Kurtis Roberts (Roberts KR212V) 20th. Marco said: “We had a very good warm-up this morning and I was very confident for the race. I was strong in the twisty part of the track but Dani had incredible acceleration – better than the Ducati. I tried to pass him as quick as possible to try and pass Casey (Stoner) and I made a mistake and lost a second. But I pushed to catch him and was at one second with six laps to go. But I couldn’t do it so with two to go I concentrated on preserving my position. We had a very good bike and tyre package today.” Dani said: “I pushed very hard at the beginning because from what we’d seen in practice I was expecting the grip level from the tyres to fall away towards the end of the race. My plan was to make a gap if possible and handle the grip situation as well as I could. For the first laps I was quite consistent behind Casey but when I started to brake later with a full tank of fuel I was losing the front-end, so I dropped back a little and that’s when Marco passed me. At that stage I was trying to maintain my rhythm and, as the race went on and the fuel load came down, I began to get a better feeling at the front of the machine under braking. I was really surprised about the high pace in the final part of the race because we didn’t expect to maintain these lap times based on what we’d seen in practice.” Elias said: “I’m happy with this result. Everything was working well in the warm-up and things improved even further with the higher temperatures in the afternoon. I had some good battles out there as I came through the pack. Once the tyres went off, I just focused on hanging on for a result. Compared to Phillip Island, we've made a big step forward here and I'm now looking forward to the last race at Valencia, in Spain, in front of my fans.” Nicky said: “The team did a really good job this weekend and the bike was working very well in the race. Unfortunately I didn’t get a great start and on the first lap or two I got boxed in everywhere and I always seemed to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. That cost me a lot of positions but once things settled down I started moving forward and was going well. Then, passing Elias at the end of the back straight, I got in too hot and it was a silly mistake which I’m not happy about. I was in the draft and just got into the corner a little too fast. After that I got back on the track, put my head down and I’m actually proud of the way we recovered.” Checa said: “I knew this was going to be a difficult race but it was better than I expected and I did the maximum. During practice and qualifying I never found a good feeling with the bike and set-up for this track. But it was a little better in the race and I was able to run consistent lap times. The best was 2m 04.1s and our target was to get into high 2’03s so that was a little disappointing. Now I’m just looking ahead to the final race of the season in Valencia in Spain.” Nakano said: “Today has been very difficult for the team and myself and I am very disappointed with the result as Sepang is one of my favourite tracks. This morning we improved some settings on the front of the bike and it did feel better than before. I was fighting with Carlos Checa and Nobuatsu Aoki but I couldn’t follow them so finally I just tried to keep my lap times consistent and hold position to get that last point. In the last couple of laps Anthony West passed me for the last point.” Roberts said: “I ran off track after the first six or seven laps, and when you’re already at the back and you lose that much time, then you’re about a minute behind. It sucks as far as that goes. But I just tried to stay in there and get more used to the bike, changing settings, and figuring out what to do for Valencia to make it better. Maybe we can reward everyone’s work there. The mechanics and crew guys have all worked really hard, so they need something to cheer about.” Results MotoGP Pole Position: Dani PEDROSA 2'01.877 163.876 Km/h World Championship Positions: |
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