Jorge Lorenzo turned in an utterly dominant performance at Mugello in Italy to extend his championship lead over Dani Pedrosa to 19 points. Pedrosa took 2nd place in the race to make sure he remains in contention in the championship.
Casey Stoner had another horrible day at the office as he recovered from a mistake early on to finish in 8th place. He was off colour the entire weekend, he only managed 5th in qualifying, and took a gamble on the extra hard tyre in the race. A move which clearly didn’t pay off. He battled with Alvaro Bautista towards the end of the race and collided with the Spaniard, himself no stranger to a bit of contact, luckily neither of them was forced off their bikes. His championship hopes are starting to fade and he needs to win at Laguna in 2 weeks time to re-assert his championship hopes.
The real hero of the day for me however was Tech-3 Yamaha rider Andrea Dovizioso. He took his 3rd consecutive podium and his 4th podium in 5 races. He has been outperforming Ben Spies who is riding the factory Yamaha by some margin. There is much speculation that the American is on his way out at Yamaha. If Dovizioso doesn’t get the factory Yamaha ride next season then something is very wrong in the world, there isn’t a more deserving guy out there. He at least provided the Italian fans with something to cheer today.
Local(and let’s face it, everybody’s) hero Valentino Rossi rode a measured and steady race to get up to 5th. He qualified in 10th due to being unable to get the soft tyre to work, an affliction he has suffered from all season. This usually leads to Hayden, and in this case, Hector Barbera as well on the satellite Ducati outqualifying him. Rossi usually beats them both in the race though, I just wonder how much further up the grid he can get if he can get his qualifying sorted.
This was a far from exciting race, with Lorenzo so dominant, and Pedrosa trying vainly to hang on to him, with nobody able to keep touch with him in turn. One thing is for sure though, it’s going to take a serious Honda effort to derail Lorenzo’s march to the 2012 world championship, he seriously looks to have the bit firmly in his teeth and will take an awful lot of stopping.
Image source: sports.mylaunchpad.com.my
NB: For those that don’t know what a “satellite bike” is that I keep referring to: It’s essentially a factory bike, but being run by a privateer team. The privateer team does it’s own development with factory help. Think of a factory bike as a 911 Turbo S, and the satellite bike as a 911 Turbo.
