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| Lorenzo keeps podium record intact while Rossi seals remarkable fourth place | | |  | The German Grand Prix at the Sachsenring today provided a thrilling afternoon's racing, with Jorge Lorenzo finishing second and his resurgent Fiat Yamaha team-mate Valentino Rossi rounding off a remarkable return from injury to finish fourth by a mere whisker. A red flag after nine laps meant the race was restarted, with Dani Pedrosa eventually taking the win after a 21-lap 'second' race.
Starting from pole for the fourth race in a row, Lorenzo lost ground to Pedrosa at the start but retook the lead on the first lap and led the way by a couple of tenths for the first nine laps. Rossi meanwhile, back racing just six weeks after breaking his leg, had dropped two places on his grid position to seventh. On the second lap he passed Hector Barbera and then loomed up behind Marco Simoncelli, passing his fellow Italian to take fifth on lap four. The World Champion had more than a second's gap to Andrea Dovizioso but he quickly started to close down on him and was in range on the ninth lap, passing him on the tenth. By then however an incident involving three riders had caused the race to be red-flagged and, with positions then taken from the end of the ninth lap, that left the top five in almost their original grid order of Lorenzo, Pedrosa, Stoner, Dovizioso and Rossi.
Thirteen riders restarted the race and it was the same story all over again, with Pedrosa passing Lorenzo into turn one but the championship-leader getting back through before the end of the first lap. The next few laps saw the two Spanish riders in some superb wheel-to-wheel action as Lorenzo tried and failed to shake Pedrosa off, the pair maintaining a nail-biting distance of about a tenth for several laps. After three wins in a row however Lorenzo finally succumbed today and on lap nine he was unable to hold his compatriot off any longer, sensibly deciding to bring his M1 home in second place for 20 points. The 23-year-old has now finished in first or second place at every one of the eight rounds this season.
The restart saw Rossi again lose some ground but he passed Hayden second time around to retake fifth and set off in pursuit of the leaders. On the sixth lap he got by Dovizioso but with a near two-second gap to Stoner it looked unlikely that the Italian would make much headway on the Australian. Rossi is always one to amaze however and he was soon lapping at the same pace as the leaders to bring himself within striking distance of Stoner with a third of the race remaining. The final six laps saw some superb action between the two rivals, with Rossi looking as if he had never been away and several brilliant overtaking manoeuvres from both riders. On the penultimate lap Rossi took the lead in what looked like a decisive move but on the final corner Stoner somehow found a way back through and the nine-time Champion was forced to settle for fourth, albeit probably the most impressive fourth position of his career.
Lorenzo's championship lead now stands at 47 points from Pedrosa, whilst Rossi moves up one place to sixth. The paddock now heads directly to Laguna Seca in California for the US Grand Prix in one weeks time.
Jorge Lorenzo - Position: 2ndTime: +3.355
"It's always difficult when a race is split like this and I think I didn't ride quite as well in the second race as I felt I had been doing in the first. Dani was very, very strong and I was on the limit trying to stay ahead. When he passed me I tried briefly to stay with him but he was much faster than me today and I was going to have to take a lot of risks to stay with him; the safest thing for me to do was finish second and take 20 points for the championship. I am happy because I never really liked this track and now I've been second here two years in a row. Now we go to Laguna and I am very excited about racing there again." |
|  | Valentino Rossi - Position: 4thTime: +5.623
"I didn't expect this! I thought it was maybe possible to make fourth or fifth place but I thought it would be very difficult. In the end I was fourth but I had a great battle with Casey and I was so close to the podium, so this is a fantastic result after missing four races. I need some more kilometres to really recover the feeling and feel completely okay with the bike again, but I think I did a great job and this was a very good comeback, better than we could wish for. I felt a bit of pain in my shoulder but more in the leg when changing direction, but at the end the battle with Casey was such fun that I didn't think about it. Unfortunately though he just got the better of me on the last corner! Thanks to all my team for helping me come back and be competitive like this, we will try to do even better in Laguna."
Wilco Zeelenberg - Team Manager
"I said before this weekend that we can't win them all and today Jorge rode another very sensible race to finish second and bring home 20 valuable points for the championship. It's a pity about the restart because the final third of the race is generally Jorge's strongest and with the shortened race he didn't have that bonus, but he rode a great race nonetheless and tried his best to stay with Pedrosa, who was a bit faster than us today. This hasn't been one of his best tracks in the past and he had some problems the first day so this is a good result for us all."
Davide Brivio - Team Manager
"In the end this race was something completely unexpected; one week ago we didn't know if we'd be able to ride here at all and then day by day our targets changed. We would have been happy whatever with a top five today but finally we were really competitive and so close to the podium. It's unbelievable and even more so because we were lapping at the same pace as the leaders. We've never been so excited by a battle for third position! It was very positive; Valentino worked so hard to be here and he made it in style, so now we will continue our plan in Laguna next weekend."
Spies storms to battling eighth in Sachsenring
Ben Spies continued his fantastic charge towards the top five in the MotoGP world championship standings this afternoon after a richly deserved eighth place in a restarted German MotoGP race.
Facing a difficult challenge after starting in a lowly 13th position following an incident-packed qualifying session, Spies was in hot pursuit of a top eight finish when the scheduled 30-lap race was red flagged on lap ten after a three-rider incident. The race was restarted over 21-laps and Spies lost contact with the group in front of him when Mika Kallio crashed at the first corner.
The 26-year-old sat in tenth position for the open ing seven laps before he managed to expertly guide his Monster Yamaha Tech 3 machine by Marco Melandri on lap nine having already disposed of Hector Barbera.
At that stage Spies was over five seconds behind compatriot Nicky Hayden, but the reigning World Superbike champion was able to embark on a stunning charge in front of 98,477 fans.
His lap times were only bettered by the leading quartet at one stage and Spies was able to lap over a second faster than the group contending fifth spot in front of him. By the end he'd closed to within two seconds of Hayden and Spies was delighted with his pace, confident had he not started so far down the field that he would been able to seriously threaten for a place in the top five.
A difficult weekend for Colin Edwards ended in disappointing fashion. Despite numerous changes to the set-up of his Monster Yamaha YZR-M1 machine throughout the weekend, Edwards was unable to discover a setting that allowed him to push at the fast pace he is capable of. And his hopes of maintaining his proud record of scoring points in every race were ended when he crashed out of 16th position shortly before the race was red flagged.
Spies and Edwards now turn their attention to the all-important American MotoGP race at Laguna Seca. It is the eagerly anticipated home race for the Texan duo and both are determined to deliver strong results for an expectant and partisan crowd. |
| Ben Spies - Position: 8thTime: +20.957
"Eighth place does not reflect what happened on track today and it was quite clear that I could have been much higher. I had the misfortune in qualifying yesterday that was nobody's fault, but starting that far back h urt me today. It wasn't easy to pass Melandri because his bike accelerates really well but once I got by and could run my own race, I was really happy with how I performed. Dovizioso, Simoncelli and Nicky were five seconds clear at that point but I got to just over a second away from them. I was pretty much the fifth fastest guy on the track and I definitely had a fifth place result in me today, but I just had bad luck with the qualifying crash. But I leave with a top eight result and I'm not that far away from fourth in the championship now. Now I'm really looking forward to going home and racing at Laguna Seca. I love the circuit and I will have a lot of support and I genuinely believe I can run in the top five." |
| Colin Edwards - Position: DNF
"I got pushed around a bit at the start and lost a bit of time and I was just pushing because what I would lose on acceleration I wo uld try and catch it all up on the brakes. It was my mistake. I ran into the last corner wide and was probably a metre off line and when I tried to pull it back I lost the front. This wasn't the result I wanted going into my home race next week at Laguna Seca but I'm more motivated than ever to get back on track and recover from a pretty difficult period in the season for me. I love Laguna and the atmosphere created by the fans and rest assured I'll be aiming to get myself much closer to the front where I know I belong in front of my home crowd."
Herve Poncharal - Team Manager
"Ben was once again very impressive this weekend and he showed that he is an expert at learning new tracks. Unfortunately his race was dictated by his qualifying position and being so far down through no fault of his own was difficult. It was a pity because we saw that he had the pace to run in t he group battling for fifth. He was catching them a lot and as always he was very fast at the end of the race. He finished the weekend on a high note and he is really fired up for Laguna Seca next week now. It was a shame that Colin crashed in the first part of the race and unfortunately he has not been able to reach the level of performance we know he can this weekend. He's never given up and worked really hard with his crew but thankfully he wasn't hurt in the crash and I know he is incredibly motivated to perform better at Laguna Seca. The whole Monster Yamaha Tech 3 Team is looking forward to Laguna Seca because the support for Ben and Colin will be incredible." |
| | 2010 MotoGP Germany - Sachsenring 18/07/2010 | | Pos. | Rider | Manu. | Nat. | Total Time | | 1 | Daniel Pedrosa | Honda | ESP | 28'50.476 | | 2 | Jorge Lorenzo | Yamaha | ESP | 0'03.355 | | 3 | Casey Stoner | Ducati | AUS | 0'05.257 | | 4 | Valentino Rossi | Yamaha | ITA | 0'05.635 | | 5 | Andrea Dovizioso | Honda | ITA | 0'17.158 | | 6 | Marco Simoncelli | Honda | ITA | 0'17.757 | | 7 | Nicky Hayden | Ducati | USA | 0'17.935 | | 8 | Ben Spies | Yamaha | USA | 0'20.957 | | 9 | Hector Barbera | Ducati | ESP | 0'22.000 | | 10 | Marco Melandri | Honda | ITA | 0'35.217 | | 11 | Loris Capirossi | Suzuki | ITA | 0'45.042 | | 12 | Alex De Angelis | Honda | SMR | 0'45.204 |
| Rider Standings | 18/07/2010 | | Pos. | Rider | Manu. | Nat. | Points | | 1. | Jorge Lorenzo | Yamaha | ESP | 185 | | 2. | Daniel Pedrosa | Honda | ESP | 138 | | 3. | Andrea Dovizioso | Honda | ITA | 102 | | 4. | Casey Stoner | Ducati | AUS | 83 | | 5. | Nicky Hayden | Ducati | USA | 78 | | 6. | Valentino Rossi | Yamaha | ITA | 74 | | 7. | Randy De Puniet | Honda | FRA | 69 | | 8. | Ben Spies | Yamaha | USA | 67 | | 9. | Marco Simoncelli | Honda | ITA | 49 | | 10. | Marco Melandri | Honda | ITA | 45 | | 11. | Hector Barbera | Ducati | ESP | 41 | | 12. | Colin Edwards | Yamaha | USA | 39 | | 13. | Loris Capirossi | Suzuki | ITA | 30 | | 14. | Aleix Espargaro | Ducati | ESP | 28 | | 15. | Alvaro Bautista | Suzuki | ESP | 25 | | 20. | Wataru Yoshikawa | Yamaha | JPN | 1 |
| Manufacturer Standings | 18/07/2010 | | Pos. | Manufacturer | Points | | 1. | Yamaha | 190 | | 2. | Honda | 162 | | 3. | Ducati | 113 | | 4. | Suzuki | 42 |
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