MotoGP: Pedrosa Pounces, Stoner Stunned

When the MotoGP circus rolls into Valencia, most fans snuggle up in front of the TV with a mug of cocoa and a teddy bear, prepared for a nice refreshing snooze. Two riders ruined the ritual this time: Casey Stoner and Ben Spies.

Stoner caused eyes to pop out on stalks across the world. Heading off the grid for the warm-up lap, the Aussie failed to make it to his pole position slot. After two corners he was caught out by the cold rear tyre and flung over the high side, the Ducati tumbling to a halt next to him. Casey has crashed in races before, but this seems to be the first time he has crashed before the race even started. On the plus side, it was pretty funny. On the downside, it has used up Valencia's allocation of interesting things for the next decade.

Dani Pedrosa had qualified 2nd, and was caught by surprise when the starting lights came on with no sign of Stoner. The miniature matador revealed that he had to start with his visor still up as he had been casually waiting for the pole sitter to appear alongside. Of course, that didn't stop the small star from taking the hole shot and disappearing into the distance on his Repsol Honda, unchallenged until the chequered flag.

Jorge Lorenzo was running in 2nd until he had a bizarre incident of his own. He got his FIAT Yamaha into a massive tank-slapper, which was so terrifying that the airbag in his leathers went off. (It puffs up around the neck area and is designed mainly to prevent broken collar bones.) With Lorenzo highly puckered after that scary moment, and hindered by his leathers turning into a sumo suit, his rival and team-mate Valentino Rossi sneaked past into 2nd. Jorge speeded back up a bit when the leathers deflated themselves, but had to settle for 3rd on a track that he has never won at in any category.

Colin Edwards was pootling round in his usual "best of the rest" style on his Monster Tech 3 Yamaha, in 4th place instead of his usual 5th as one of the four "aliens" had crashed on the warm-up lap. The Texas Tornado had to score plenty more points than Andrea Dovizioso if he was to steal 4th place in the championship. However, Dovi was in 7th place on the second Repsol Honda machine, which was enough to nick the championship position from Edwards.

That was until Ben Spies started charging through the field. He was supposedly using the race as a test before his transfer to Tech 3 Yamaha, and was running Yamaha's test team bike with the Sterilgarda colours from his title-winning World Superbike. Sure enough, Benny Elbowz started off gently, but got quicker and quicker as the race went on, starting to overtake people on a track where there is little overtaking, in a race series where there is little overtaking. With growing astonishment, the crowd saw Spies rise to 8th place, and finally pass Dovizioso for 7th.

This overtake guaranteed 5th place in the championship to his fellow Texan, and team-mate next year at "Tex 2" Tech 3 Yamaha, Colin Edwards, who danced for joy and hugged Spies when the race was over.

So it was a relative snoozefest as usual, since the Valencia track is just too small and nadgery for MotoGP bikes, being a more exciting track for the baby categories. However, it will be remembered for two reasons: the coming of Ben Spies, and the going of Casey Stoner.

MotoGP: Post-Misano Musings

Now that the dust has settled from the San Marino round of the MotoGP championship at Misano, here are the main talking points that came up: Casey's constant crashing, and Pedrosa ditching les pneus français for most honorable number one Japanese tyres.

Stoner
The little Australian world champion was addicted to crashing in his younger days (hell, he still doesn't look a day over 12.) Like all addicts, Casey has suffered a relapse. That losing battle with Rossi at Laguna has rattled him severely. Stoner claimed Rossi's passing moves were too hard, worse than he's seen for years. He obviously hasn't watched any World Superbikes lately, where those kinds of forceful passes are so common that TV commentator James Whitham's usual cry when he sees a hard move, "Have some of that!" has almost become a catchphrase.

Casey fell off at Laguna during a huge battle with Rossi that made him lose his cool. His desperation to avoid another such battle has led him to fall off at the following two races. (Thanks to those of you who voted in the last poll, where 76% of you thought that Rossi had Stoner rattled. Good call, people.) Rossi has finally discovered the Stoner/Ducati weakness. They don't like it up 'em!

Pedrosa
The eency-weency, teeny-weeny, itty-bitty Spaniard has been even more sour-faced than usual lately. You thought that Rossi turned into a whinger when he fell out with Michelin? You ain't seen nothing! At least it's less of a surprise that Pedrosa would spit the dummy and chuck the toys out of the pram, considering that he could be mistaken for a 6 month old baby. Such is the strength of Pedrosa's hatred for Michelin (he didn't even want to be on frog-sourced rubber this year), and the strength of his personal mananger Alberto Puig's control over HRC, that the Repsol Honda team will run Dani on Bridgestone tyres, starting immediately.

Changing tyres mid-season? What the hell? This has obviously been on the cards for a little while. Some of the satellite Honda bikes have been on Bridgestones for a couple of years, so HRC have data about how to make a Honda work on Bridgestones. Just to check that this data was applicable to the factory Honda, HRC cunningly gave Bridgestone runner Shinya Nakano a full-fat Dani Pedrosa bike, complete with his favoured steel valve springs. Nakano has had a couple of good showings and set some fast laps. This proves that the Bridgestone setup data accumulated by the Honda Gresini team can be applied to the factory Repsol Honda.

Sure, it's a big risk to switch tyre companies mid-season, if you actually care about this year's championship result. But Dani and HRC don't really care. This year is lost, and they are using the last few races as the best kind of testing there is: racing. Add to that the fact that Honda know all about how Bridgestones work on Dani's bike, thanks to Shinya. This is definitely not the same as Rossi's switch to Bridgestones, which nobody had ever bolted to a Yamaha M1 before. Honda don't need a genius like Rossi's Aussie engineer Jeremy Burgess, they just need an HRC engineer who has worked in the Gresini garage. Simple.

The switch will be a major psychological boost for the po-faced Spaniard, and he's a damned quick rider and fast learner. How he will fare for the rest of the season is anybody's guess, but he could surprise us all.

MotoGP: Dani Disappears in Barcelona

Dani Pedrosa, the man who not only uses up all the superlatives in the thesaurus, but also all the synonyms for "short-arse". When he gets on a roll, he's unstoppable. The only thing that could fluster him is somebody giving him a bit of a shove as they overtake, and there was no danger of that in the Catalunya GP.

Dani vanished into thin air, breaking the lap record on his first flying lap and continuing to go faster and faster until he had concocted an 8 second lead. After that he calmed down and finished a mere couple of seconds in front of the chasing pack. Who said there was something wrong with spring valve engines? A lot of people, and they're all idiots. When the 800cc MotoGP rules were pushed through by Honda, everybody thought that Honda would dominate in the first couple of years, what with Honda being the best engine maker in the world, from lawn mowers to outboards.

It took them a while, but the Japanese factory have re-discovered their brilliance. Nobody else can build a spring valve engine that is so smooth, so efficient and so damned quick. That's why the others have all moved to air valves (or stuck with desmodromics in the case of Ducati.) "Oh, you just can't make the power with steel springs," they cried. Then when the Honda started getting ominously quick down the straights it was "Oh, you can make the power, but you'll drink so much fuel you'll never last the race."

Uh-huh. Really. That's odd, because it looked like little Dani on the steel-sprung engine disappeared into the wide blue yonder on a track where you need both flexibility and top end speed. Honda have said that they'll bring out the air valve motor just as soon as it's better than the spring valve version. There's no point using air springs just because they're the technology du jour. You use them when they're quicker than what you've got. Since the steel sprung Honda is quicker than the air valve Suzuki and Kawasaki, on a par with the air valve Yamaha, and just a few K slower than the awesome desmo Ducati, there's no way Honda are going to introduce their own inflatable motor until it's ready.

Of course, Nicky Hayden wants the air sprung engine because he doesn't get on with the steel spring version. In fact, he doesn't get on with the Honda at all. Not the way it handles, not the way it uses its tyres, not the way the electronics kick in, and definitely not the way his manly shoulders stick out past the fairing that was designed for Pedrosa's girlish form. What he really wants is Marco Melandri's seat for next year, and it's looking like a real possibility.

At Barcelona, Valentino Rossi rose from the ashes of 9th on the grid to drag his Yamaha to 2nd spot on the podium in front of Casey Stoner, the only guy who's in the same postcode as the Ducati. Rossi celebrated wildly, leading Randy Mamola to wisecrack that Rossi loves 2nd place almost as much as he does (Mamola having finished 2nd in the 500GP world championship no less than 4 times.) Valentino's daft leathers this weekend were an imitation of the Italian national football kit, with bright pink arms and knees showing. (Fittingly, Italy finished 2nd in their game against Holland in the Euro 2008 tournament, having been horsed 3-0. Yes, I'm days late writing this.)

I'm sure Stoner was complaining about something to excuse finishing in 3rd, but I wasn't paying attention. He was still a full minute in front of his team-mate on an identical bike.

Ummm, who else was good? Let's see, Dovi, Edwards and Toseland (who had never seen the Barcelona track before) in 4th, 5th and 6th respectively. Everybody else was pretty rubbish, though John Hopkins was riding a lot more injured than he let on, after a big practise crash. De Puniet crashed in the race (shock, horror) while Capirossi and de Angelis got tangled up like Dovi and Toseland did at Le Mans, with both Italians ending up in the gravel trap. Capirex has a nasty hand injury that may rule him out of Donington, though we don't know yet because he's an outrageously tough little psycho. Jorge Lorenzo didn't even start, after a very nasty crash in practise left him with a severe concussion. Word is that he thought he was still in China when he woke up. Luckily, he should have recovered by Donington, although he'll need surgery to place a skin graft on a grated finger.

Dani Pedrosa also managed to hurt himself in a testing crash on Monday, but should be OK with a bit of rest.

Conclusions. Pedrosa is stunningly quick when he gets out in front. Honda don't need to rush their pneumatic valved engine out. Rossi is still looking like a real predator.

MotoGP Jerez: Pedrosa Perfect, Stoner Sinks

The Jerez round of the 2008 MotoGP Championship brought us a breathtaking display of miniature dominance by Dani Pedrosa. (That says dominance, not dominatrix. We don't talk about Max Mosley round here.) However, all those idiots who claimed Stoner would find a way to finish on the podium (me for example) were proved to be as bird-brained as the kind of ageing motorsports dictator who gets filmed by a scumbag tabloid visiting a dominatrix. (Oops.)

Pole position had been taken by big-headed rookie Jorge Lorenzo. When I say "taken", I'm talking "Berlin was taken by the Red Army", not "King's pawn was taken by rook". The cocky Spaniard destroyed such nobodies as Rossi and Pedrosa to the tune of six tenths of a second! I think this kid might just have what it takes to be a MotoGP rider, you know? The other hero of qualifying was Colin Edwards, who produced one of the best saves I've ever seen. He lost the front, lowsided and was sliding off the track when he somehow picked the bike up with his knee and elbow, plonked the bike back on its tyres and rode off. After that, he even had the chutzpah to turn to the crowd and wave to accept their cheers. Brilliant stuff from the Texas Tornado, but unfortunately it used up 8 of his 9 lives for the weekend.

In the race, Dani Pedrosa basically got out in front and disappeared into the distance, showing that he's a genius, even if he gives boring interviews and bitches about his team-mate too much. I love watching Dani on the ragged edge, hanging off the bike, his left foot coming off the peg. You can see that the little impresario is wringing the bike's neck. For some reason it wasn't as boring as when Stoner does the same, even though the director didn't cut to Adriana in the pits so often. Nobody got anywhere near the teeniest bloke in the paddock until he parked the bike in parc ferme.

Valentino Rossi reminded us that he's one of the greatest riders of all time by taking second place on Bridgestone tyres. Apparently Vale doesn't even have custom tyres yet, as he and Jeremy Burgess are still working out how to set up a bike on Bridgestone rubber. I think that might change next time out. The other Bridgestone runners should be afraid. OK, this is one of Rossi's best tracks, but he still finished nearly 25 seconds ahead of the next Bridgestone-shod bike. The only problem Valentino had was an inability to count to 27, as he thought the race was over on lap 26. I know how he feels. Even if I take my shoes and socks off I can only count to 24...

Lorenzo couldn't quite replicate his qually peformance, but hung onto Rossi to take an excellent 3rd place. He even managed a great save when he had a simultaneous tank slapper and wheelie that shook his right foot off the peg. 2 races in MotoGP, 2 pole positions, 2 podiums. Yamaha can't half pick 'em, eh? Spain's excellent King Juan Carlos proved once again that he's a cut above Prince Harry by forcing arch enemies Pedrosa and Lorenzo to shake hands on the way to the podium. His Majesty then indulged in animated conversation with Valentino. Top bloke.

Nicky Hayden had a decent run in 4th. He looked like he might just grab 3rd, or 2nd at a push, but then he did an Edwards in turn 1. Nearly falling off the lowside, he lifted the bike back up on his knee, maybe using a bit of elbow too, and continued on his way. That's how they do it in the South, y'all.

Loris Capirossi showed that he's still a little psycho to take 5th on the last corner, fractions in front of James Toseland, John Hopkins and Andrea Dovizioso. I'm a big Capirossi fan, so it was great to see him back on form, never afraid to bang fairings with the other guys. Last year looked like a disaster for Little Loris, but with hindsight he was a hell of a lot closer to Stoner than any of this year's Ducati guys. I mean, can you see Melandri winning a race this year?

James Toseland was half-dead from bronchitis, looking and sounding truly atrocious. The Englishman had used a few of his trademark WSBK moves to get up the field, seriously pissing off Dovi. The youngster lunged in the last corner, Toseland was pushed wide but cut inside to beat Dovizioso, and during all the excitement Capirex chucked it down the inside of everyone, taking 2 places in one corner. By the time Dovi returned from the car park, Hopper had flung the Kwaka through the gap too. Excellent, dude.

Casey Stoner? Who? Oh right, the guy in 11th. The reigning World Champ was much closer to the front. Twice. However, the Ducati was completely unrideable. Yeah, I know it's always completely unrideable, but this time even Casey couldn't keep it on the black stuff. Early on he was doing brilliantly when it nearly fired him off, losing him places. Then he fought his way up only for it to run off into the gravel. Once more, he fought back and looked like he might finish as high as 5th when the bike once more lost the front and he ended up ploughing through the kitty litter for a second time. Can't fault him for lack of effort, but it was his worst ever race on the Bologna Bullet.

Marco Melandri finished just 2.2 seconds behind Stoner. Normally that would be great but this time was rubbish, considering that Casey had been off twice and the only way the Aussie would know what the racing line looked like would be if Pedrosa had sent him a postcard. Alas poor Marco! I knew him, Horatio. The Italian should probably call in the forensics experts from CSI Miami to find out who murdered his career. (Hint, he's short, cocky and has a number 1 on the front of his motorcycle.)

What ever happened to Colin Edwards, with his qualifying on the front row and his great save? He fell off. For some reason, he's nailed qualifying at last, but can't race to save himself. Ah well, you can't win 'em all. Or any of 'em, in Colin's case.

All in all, a great race. This year's championship looks like a corker. Pedrosa, Rossi, Lorenzo and Stoner are turning this into a golden era, the likes of which we haven't seen since the early 1990's. Dani is as brilliant as ever, Rossi is still a genius, Lorenzo is stunningly quick. Toseland's a brilliant addition to the series with his ability to slam opponents out of the way without actually endangering them. He'll be one to watch when he gets the air-sprung engine soon. Casey Stoner had a horrible day that he'll want to forget. Well, at least it wasn't him who got caught spanking prostitutes dressed as concentration camp prisoners by the "News of the Screws".

MotoGP: How Small is Dani Pedrosa?

With the MotoGP season starting the week after next, everybody is asking the same question: just how tiny is Dani Pedrosa?

Well, I've done a few quick calculations comparing Pedrosa to some normal, everyday objects to give the viewer at home an idea of the teeny Spaniard's size. These sums assume that Pedrosa is 1.58 metres tall (5'2") and weighs 51kg (112 lb or 8 stone). Measurements are expressed in the units of the Dani (height) and the Pedrosa (weight).

Firstly, a comparison to everybody's favourite escaped mental patient, World Superbike racer Ruben Xaus. The Chaotic Catalan measures 1.16 Danis in height, and weighs a hefty 1.45 Pedrosas.

The little Spanish superstar fares no better in comparison to the type of animals you are likely to encounter in your living room while watching MotoGP. The typical male African Elephant stands at 2.5 Danis in height, weighing a ground-shaking 147 Pedrosas. It would be tempting to construct an elephant out of Dani Pedrosas, if we could just find another 146 of him. (These may exist in an HRC genetics lab halfway up Mount Fuji.)

A decent sized giraffe stands as high as 3.48 Danis and weighs just 25.5 Pedrosas, so it would be much easier to make a giraffe than an elephant out of the little motorcyclist, though this would still exceed the world supply of 1 Dani Pedrosa.

Moving on to the plant world, a Giant Redwood tree reaches an incredible 53.8 Danis into the sky, and tips the scales at a staggering 41,000 Pedrosas.

Speaking of the sky, a Boeing 747-400 stands on the runway at 19.4 Danis in height, and has a maximum take-off weight of over 7,700 Pedrosas. Needless to say, a jumbo jet won't be too stressed taking the actual Dani Pedrosa to his long-haul destinations.

Finally, King Kong's favourite hangout: the Empire State building, which stretches 443 Danis into the heavens and weighs more than 7 million Pedrosas. It is likely that Dani's small size relative to the Empire State building will protect him from being climbed by giant apes when he visits the United States this year.

Hopefully this technical guide should be of some help when you are watching this year's MotoGP series.

MotoGP Valencia: Tiny Man Wins, Fat Lady Sings.

The MotoGP season ended as Dani Pedrosa took a dominant victory at the Valencia GP, that left Casey Stoner scrabbling for his book of excuses (he's still stuck on page 1: Couldn't Find a Setup).

The microscopic Catalan had started from pole position again, his 4th in as many races. There's nothing much wrong with the factory Honda now, as was shown when Pedrosa zipped past Stoner on the straight and outbraked him into turn one. Of course, you can get away with your engine being several horsepower down when your rider is ten kilos lighter than Capirossi. We saw early on that little Dani was on top form when he passed his fast-starting team-mate Nicky Hayden with a proper overtaking move. Pedrosa's victory secured 2nd place in the championship, just 125 points behind Stoner.

At first it seemed like Stoner was making a break, but Dani reeled him in. It was good to see Stoner overtaken for once. Don't get me wrong, he's incredibly quick, but Casey's a cold fish compared to his countrymen: the likeable Chris Vermeulen and the magnificently Australian Ant West. In a way, Stoner has me yearning for the stupid celebrations of Rossi, rather than Casey's cocky claims that he won by 5 seconds without even trying. This time we were back to the bad setup excuse, previously seen when Barros overtook him in Italy. Old hands at Ducati will be remembering Carl Fogarty's ability to ride around any problem with the bike through sheer bloody mindedness.

Don't get me wrong, Stoner is a worthy champion, and a decent bet for next year's title, but he just reminds me of soccer star Alan Shearer, who revealed that he had celebrated his team's amazing feat of winning the English Premier League by painting his garden fence with a fresh coat of creosote. Well, at least the kid married a stunning Aussie girl rather than bringing his tubby friend along for us to look at when he's winning.

John Hopkins had a lonely race to 3rd place, just a fraction slower than the guys in front, but easily quicker than those behind. It will be fascinating to see him on the Kwaka, which has looked stunningly quick with Randy de Puniet on board (though we tend to see Randy flying through the air alongside the bike as much as we see him actually on board the machine.) Hopper's team-mate for next year, Ant West, had a nightmare. Westy claimed that after the race he had finally twigged where he was going wrong with the setup, showing a learning ability that is more akin to Anthony Gobert than Jeremy Burgess.

Loris Capirossi was 5th ahead of his team-mate for next year Chris Vermeulen. Alex Barros was 7th in his one millionth and final Grand Prix. The knives are out as he has revealed what a bunch of clowns the D'Antin Ducati team are. Poor old Barros didn't even have a suspension technician, which is ludicrous at this level of competition, and he was ordered to stop overtaking factory Ducatis, which is pathetic. The D'Antin team has been renamed Alice Ducati for next year. (Alice? Who the...)

Carlos Checa was riding in his last GP despite a mystery illness, and goes to Ten Kate in WSBK next year after undercutting Barros's pay demands.

Who have I missed out? Ah yes, Valentino Rossi. Remember him? He was crocked in a massive crash in qualifying, where he was thrown off after a vicious tank-slapper and broke 3 bones in his hand. The Doctor needed the help of the Quack (Costa), but was able to race. He started on the back row, and was just starting to overtake people when his Yamaha conked out. Heaven knows why, considering that he couldn't even pass Tamada down the straights. He was thoroughly disgusted that it was the bike that failed and not the Michelin tyres.

Kurtis Roberts pulled the Team KR machine in with another engine problem, proving that the 15,000 of us with our names on the bike had brought no luck whatsoever. Oh well. Hopefully Team KR can get the Ducati support they are hoping for next year.

MotoGP Sachsenring: Dani Demolition

Miniature Spaniard Dani Pedrosa destroyed the opposition in the German GP at the Sachsenring to take his first victory for over a year, and end one of HRC's longest and most humiliating losing streaks.
Honda were behind the switch to an 800cc MotoGP class, allegedly because it would suit their new superstar Pedrosa, but supposedly to improve safety. Until now, Honda's 800cc V4 machine has been a real dog, never looking like a winning machine. As for safety, the 800's have given us two riders with broken femurs along with serious injuries to Kenny Junior's ego and Loris Capirossi's market value.
In East Germany, HRC's fortunes turned 180 degrees (roughly how hot it was at the Sachsenring). In qualifying, Pedrosa was beaten to pole by Casey Stoner, but only by 4 thousandths of a second. Before bolting on a qualifying tyre, Pedrosa had put in an ominous run of staggeringly fast laps on a race tyre. However, Honda weren't having it all their own way. Nicky Hayden had a massive engine blowup in Friday practise that treated Eurosport viewers to the hilarious performance of pitlane reporter and analyst Randy Mamola hopping over the pitwall and picking up chunks of Honda V4. The little Californian ex-racer and 500GP racewinner amazingly found a valve head from Hayden's bike, showing that the Honda motor had well and truly detonated.
In the race, Stoner made an excellent start, but Pedrosa soon nipped past.
Behind them, Valentino Rossi had made a weak start. The Doctor had been forced to visit a real Doctor, well Doctor Costa anyway, as he was running a fever and having mild breathing difficulties. Unsurprisingly, Dr Costa signed off Rossi as fit to race. (Unsurprising because Costa would quite possibly sign off a corpse as fit to race, and if you believe a certain "scurrilous website", that's exactly what he has been doing with Alex Barros for some years!)
Rossi was stuck behind Randy de Puniet, who was racing well after a hideous crash in qualifying that saw him hit the air fence, closely followed by his bike. With the FIAT Yamaha overheating, Rossi became increasingly desperate to find clear air. He jammed his bike down the inside of de Puniet, and with the two side by side you would get odds of a million to one on which was most likely to fall off in the next 2 seconds. Unbelievably, it was Rossi. Instead of just shoving the Kawasaki out wide, Rossi tried to turn tightly inside it and lowsided out of the race in a shower of sparks.
Up front, Stoner stayed within a few tenths of Pedrosa, but the gap turned into a chasm when Dani put the hammer down and Stoner's Bridgestone tyres went off horribly. All of a sudden, the Repsol Honda was disappearing over the horizon at 2 seconds per lap and the Aussie had no answer.
It rapidly became clear that Bridgestone were having a nightmare.
The only Bridgestone runner to escape was Loris Capirossi, who has had such a terrible season so far that he was able to throw caution to the wind and run a completely different compound to everybody else. It might have been a shot in the dark, but it was a masterstroke. The Italian quickly caught up on his team-mate, who was battling with Marco Melandri. Capirossi sailed past both of them into turn one, running wide but showing his old self when he slammed the door on his young team-mate with great relish. Capirex then disappeared into a safe second place, which he held to the finish.
Nicky Hayden had started 14th and was then spooked by a funny noise from his bike. After messing around with the engine mapping, the Kentucky Kid decided it wasn't going to blow up and he may as well press on. He then rode a brilliant race, scything through the field to finish 3rd and put a second HRC Repsol Honda on the podium.
Colin Edwards followed Hayden home in 4th, pushing Stoner to 5th. As Rossi DNF'd (can't think of a better way to spell that), Stoner still extends his championship lead to 32 points, meaning he cannot lose the lead before Brno regardless of what happens next week at Laguna Seca.
Ant West took 8th place after his Kawasaki team-mate de Puniet's bike conked out on the last lap leaving him 15th but not classified as a finisher. Another decent day for the Aussie, who held off The Hoff on the d'Antin Ducati.
Honda's baffling choice of Michel Fabrizio to replace Toni Elias paid off with a 10th place, though of the 4 people behind him he only really beat Kurtis Roberts on the track. Vermeulen had a stop-go after jumping the start due to a dragging clutch, Tamada came in for a tyre change and Carlos Checa took the final points in 14th despite falling off, visiting the pits and rejoining 3 laps down.
Honour has returned to the HRC team with an excellent performance. Michelin take a lot of credit, but Pedrosa was clearly the fastest thing on the track anyway. Hayden has returned to form just in time for Laguna Seca, as has Colin Edwards. Loris Capirossi will be over the moon at his 2nd place, which should give his manager a bit more clout in the marketplace so long as he has a half-decent race in the USA.
Next week, California. It will be a crucial race for Valentino Rossi, who could do with 25 points, but can he beat the Hondas, his team-mate and Casey Stoner on a track where he has never won?

MotoGP: 2007 Preview Rant

It's the time of year when everybody's writing a preview of this year's racing, and they're all virtually identical. To spice things up a little, I've decided to do my preview in the form of a rant.
Who are the potential champions?
Rossi, Rossi and Rossi.
Alright, Pedrosa and Hayden both have some chance of winning the 2007 title, but The Doctor has to be the odds-on favourite.
Valentino Rossi lost the 2006 title for one major reason: the 2006 Yamaha was an ill-handling bucket of bolts. The early races of the season showed that Yamaha had dropped a real stinker. The bike had hideous amounts of chatter, and therefore had an aversion to going round corners quickly.
Eventually, workers were forced to sneak out of the Yamaha factory in the middle of the night and chuck the 2006 frame into a nearby canal, then dust off the 2005 frame that they'd turned into a coffee table. It still didn't handle well, leading to the most surprising moment of 2006: Rossi's identically-dressed chum Uccio actually doing something useful. At the Turkish GP, he pointed out that the bike had eaten its front Michelin, not the rear. Of course, nobody listened because, well, he's just Uccio. After that, the bike had all sorts of engine trouble for the rest of the year.
There was another reason why Rossi didn't do well in 2006: he was still messing around with Formula One. Luckily he has realized the truth about F1. The racing isn't worthy of the name, the drivers are boring idiots, the team bosses are boring idiots, the fans... Well, you know the rest. The F1 journalists are such snobs that they faint whenever Kimi Raikkonen passes out drunk in the street or whips out his little general in a strip club. Yawn. Rossi would've died of boredom in F1.
Unlike the 2006 bike, his year's Yamaha M1 is a missile. We know this because Edwards is quick on it. The Texan Tornado is famous for his inability to ride a chattering bike, so last year's machine was a nightmare for the easy-going Yank. This year, he looks brilliant, which means that Rossi looks unstoppable.
Dani Pedrosa had a stunning debut year in MotoGP, proving that he is every bit as good as the people who could be bothered watching 250GP said he was. (Well, 250 just doesn't have the unbeatable teenage insanity of the 125's, does it?)
Unfortunately we also discovered that the pocket-sized Spaniard has a personality to suit his physical presence: if it was any smaller it wouldn't exist at all. The debate rages on: is Dani a genetically modified mutant grown in an HRC test tube, or simply an advanced robot? Do they debrief him after a race, or just plug a USB cable into his earhole and download the data to a laptop?
Dani's main problem seems to be that he doesn't like real racing, which is all knees, elbows, and tyre marks on the leathers. At Brno, he complained that Rossi was too tough on him. Oh, boo hoo! Ross didn't rack up those top-class titles by prancing around like a ballerina. He won them by scraping fairings with racers like Max Biaggi and Sete Gibernau. Pedrosa will have to grow a pair if he is going to win the title without a serious machinery advantage, and the 2007 Honda's just not quick enough for that. I can't see the expressionless little baby winning this year's title unless something goes horribly wrong for Rossi.
Nicky Hayden has an outside chance of winning the title, but no more than that. Bear in mind that Hayden took the lead of the championship fairly early in the season last year, and was always trying to safeguard his points lead. The only time that The Kentucky Kid went hell for leather was at his home race at Laguna Seca.
Hayden is certainly under-rated by many people, mainly starry-eyed Rossi fans. Another thing that has emerged to prove that Hayden is better than many think is the performance of the 2007 Honda.
It's crap.
And Hayden's 2006 bike was an unnatural hybrid of 2006 and 2007 parts. It turns out that the 2007 parts came out of a dog's backside, and Hayden wasted hours of practise time trying to make them work. Yet he still won the title.
Nicky has the balls to retain his #1 plate, and battle with Rossi or anybody else. The best thing for him will be if he has a slowish start to the season, and thinks "Screw it, Dude! I'm Number One! Let's just win or crash!" I believe that he is capable of taking several wins this year, if he taps into the speed he always shows at Laguna without returning to his early MotoGP performances, which involved crashing with 5 laps to go at nearly every single race.
So there you have it. Vale, Dani or Nicky? I reckon The Doctor will win the title, but with potential racewinners realistically including Rossi, Pedrosa, Hayden, Edwards, Capirossi, Stoner, Melandri, Hopkins and Vermeulen, this should be an outstanding year!