MOTOGP 2011

Hey anyone catch the moto gp racing at Qatar this weekend, awesome racing on a floodlit circuit in the middle of the dessert..

http://www.motogp.com/en great pictures and details here

my thoughts are:-

Honda look very strong, 4 bikes in the top 5!! so fast on the straights. At one point i thought it would be a Honda 1,2,3.Stoner looked really at home on the new bike and looked like he could have gone faster if he needed to

Yamaha and Lorenzo came good at the end with a solid performance and he looked super happy at the end to have finished in second. Spies is a gifted rider and was probably a bit dissapointed not to get in the top 5.

I think Simocelli is one to watch this year, very fast and aggresive, reminds me of a young Rossi.

Speaking of Rossi, what a start!! haha he pulled a few places back at the end, but he can't be happy with 7th, maybe Qatar isn't a Ducati track, in the past they were horsepower kings, with Yamaha handling the best. But with Honda upping their game, Ducati need to do some more testing. I wonder if they fixed the nervous front end this year?

All in all some great racing, and its nice to see a British lad mixing it up with the 5 Spaniards, 4 Italians, 3 Americans, 1 Ozzie, French, Jap Chec.. it looks to me like a great season of racing ahead.. bring on the madness of Spain!!

Haha and what the hell happened to Toni Elias???

Well, I'm French, and I can tell you it's beginning to get boring to see Randy de Puniet on the ground yet again... He's a very fast rider, on a good day I'm sure he could match the speed of the best riders out there on the same bike, but please stay on the damn bike man...
1st race with Pramac, the management should not be too impressed with both riders out because of a clash between teammates...

Lorenzo's 2nd place is IMHO only thanks to the physical problems of Pedrosa. Without his numbness he would have kept the 2nd place easily thanks to the Honda.

Well Jerez was a bit of a belter then! I was on my toes the whole time but pretty disappointed by some of crashes, particularly simoncelli. Would've been so good to see him take his first win or even podium! He has the speed, he'll get one this year i'm sure. Rossi was another letdown, stupid move going into turn 1 so fast and taking stoner out with him. Very unfair on stoner, especially all the marshals rushing to help rossi and leaving him stranded there, not cool. Rossi has shown that he's not to be dismissed though after climbing up all the way from 12th. Bring on the season!

To the shanghai crowd: the ducati cafe has just opened at 1933, i was there this afternoon and they said they'll be showing the GPs this season, anyone up for meeting there for the next one? I forgot to ask about WSBK but i'm sure they'll show that too, especially seeing as Checa is looking so strong on the duke this year!

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Originally Posted by felix

Well Jerez was a bit of a belter then! I was on my toes the whole time but pretty disappointed by some of crashes, particularly simoncelli. Would've been so good to see him take his first win or even podium! He has the speed, he'll get one this year i'm sure. Rossi was another letdown, stupid move going into turn 1 so fast and taking stoner out with him. Very unfair on stoner, especially all the marshals rushing to help rossi and leaving him stranded there, not cool. Rossi has shown that he's not to be dismissed though after climbing up all the way from 12th. Bring on the season...

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Ditto with those comments... especially concerning Stoner and Rossi!

I felt sorry for Casey Stoner, but I'll withhold judgement of Rossi. Yeah, he went in a little hot, but I don't think it was unreasonable. Racing on rain tires on a drying track is awful. I felt worse for Spies and Edwards. I've been a Spies fan since he began racing AMA superbikes and it would have been nice to see his first MotoGP podium. Edwards never seems to get a break, he's always a consistent rider, but can't seem to place anymore, and to have a mechanical on the last lap! It was nice to see Nicky Hayden get on the podium, but it seems he just got there through attrition.

I'm really looking forward to the rest of the season. WSBK was interesting last weekend too. What the hell was Biaggi thinking!?

Cheers,

Dan K.

Biaggi: haha, what a tool. "I didn't see the signs, was too busy racing." You'd think with such a massive jump start he might have thought to keep an eye out for his ride through. Been racing what, 20+ years? Can't wait for Assen!

Spies is pretty cool yeah, i missed most of his ama days but he was cool to watch in wsbk. Didn't he already get a podium in motogp? Last year at silverstone if i remember correctly.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by felix

Biaggi: haha, what a tool. "I didn't see the signs, was too busy racing." You'd think with such a massive jump start he might have thought to keep an eye out for his ride through. Been racing what, 20+ years? Can't wait for Assen!

Spies is pretty cool yeah, i missed most of his ama days but he was cool to watch in wsbk. Didn't he already get a podium in motogp? Last year at silverstone if i remember correctly.

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Yeah, sometimes I like Biaggi, and sometimes I can't stand him. Can't fault too much of his riding (He is WSBK champion after all). How could he not think to look for the ride through signs when he obviously knew he jumped? He got less than zero advantage from it though because he came to a full stop immediately while the rest of the field started. Had he done his ride-through immediately, he could have used the rest of the race to make up positions. At the very least he would have gotten a championship point. Either way, my opinion of him lessened even more after the incident with Melandri during qualifying. And that's something that came out of Biaggi's repeated blocking of other riders on their fast qualifying lap.

You're right of course about Spies. I should have written ". . .of 2011".

Cheers,

Dan K.