Monday, April 12, 2010

Rossi capitalises on Stoner's crash to win in Qatar

Valentino Rossi’s star shone brightest underneath the Qatar night sky as the Italian won the 104th race of his glittering career. This win was one of his least expected as Casey Stoner dominated the weekend but the 2007 world champion crashed out of the lead leaving a delighted Rossi to top the podium.

It was a textbook performance from Rossi, the reigning world champion, but it was not an easy win for the Yamaha man as he was involved in a titanic battle with Honda’s Andrea Dovizioso and his former teammate Nicky Hayden, now riding for Ducati.

The trio pulled away from the pack early and tussled amongst themselves for the lead with Dovizioso’s Honda showing exceptional straight line speed but Rossi able to open enough of a gap through the tighter sections to just about stay ahead of his compatriot.

Hayden had arguably his best race for Ducati as he fought for the race lead but he was unable to make a move on his rivals. With six laps to go Rossi decided that he needed to break away from his pursuers and he set a series of fast laps leaving Dovizioso and Hayden were left to battle with Jorge Lorenzo for the remaining podium places.

Lorenzo had a measured race from the front row. The Spaniard conserved his tyres initially and used this to his advantage attacking late to claim second after a daring overtaking move on Dovizioso who managed to beat Hayden to the line for the bottom step of the season opening podium.

Away from the leaders American rookie Ben Spies showed that he will be more than capable on a MotoGP bike as the reigning World Superbikes champion finished in fifth. He displayed bravery in battling with Dani Pedrosa and he also had enough speed to comfortably pull away from the factory Honda rider.

Pedrosa is one of the highest rated riders on the grid but the diminutive rider struggled all weekend with his Honda and was soundly beaten by teammate Dovizioso. It will be a case of back to the drawing board for Pedrosa as he searches for the answers to unlocking the correct suspension settings to give him confidence to attack. He managed to make his trademark fantastic start and led into turn one from ninth on the grid but he was only going to move backwards from there and eventually fell as far as seventh finishing 16 seconds behind the victor.

Stoner was left to rue his mistake and seeing his title rival Rossi open a 25 point lead in the title chase. It may be early days but the Australian knows that giving his rival a lead puts him at a severe disadvantage in the early running of the season. As a result of Rossi rarely crashing he collects podiums with ease and Stoner will know that he must bounce back and win the Japanese Grand Prix in two weeks or run the risk of having to climb a mountain to challenge for the title.

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