Somewhere between the tulips and windmills, MotoGP riders assembled in Assen, Netherlands this Saturday for the Dutch GP. Loyal Dutch fans were treated to a race that saw the front-runner break away from the rest of the group, a series of sketchy passes, some key crashes, and a hair-raising battle for 6th place. Continue after the jump for some sizable spoilers.
With the Dutch GP a day ahead of the other racing events, today’s Friday qualifying session was not only special because of its weekday time slot, but also because of the close clustering of riders for the top 3 spots. Valentino Rossi had a squeaker of a run, just beating out Dani Pedrosa by under a tenth of a second. Rossi is looking for his 100th win at the Dutch track, and seems to be on-track to achieving that goal.
Silly season continues here at Asphalt & Rubber. Next up on the rumormill is James Toseland, who is rumored to be looking at a return to World Superbike, possibly with the Alstare Suzuki team.
If that title didn’t illicit a “huh?” from you, then let us be the first to say the MotoGP rumormill has kicked it up a notch now that we’re about a third of the way through the 2009 season. The first rumor up to bat is the talk that Red Bull, the maker of the energy drink with wings, is looking to sponsor a MotoGP team. Early speculation places Red Bull flying into premiere motorcycle racing with the factory Honda team, which is currently Repsol Honda.
That brings us to our next rumor in this double-header, Repsol is rumored to be considering a move to Yamaha next year. Displeased with the performance Honda has given them in bringing a Spanish MotoGP Champion into fruition, the Spanish Oil company is looking for new tune at the Piano making company. More bizzaro after the jump.
After today’s amazing race in Catalunya, the MotoGP Championship standings have become a three-way tie for first place. Valentino Rossi, Jorge Lorenzo, and Casey Stoner each have 106 points apiece, in what is becoming a closely fought season.
With a tenth of a second separating Jorge Lorenzo and Valentino Rossi in yesterday’s qualifying, the Catalan GP was shaping up to be a MotoGP race worth watching. Adding to the intrigue was a course that is especially demanding on tires, and a heat wave that was sure to make the rubber selection ever more critical. Bridgestone brought to the track an asymmetrical tire compound that was expected to help teams, but with so many factors going on, race day was bound to get interesting.
The fans at the Circuit de Catalunya were given a treat of a race, that saw two riders battling it out until the very last turn. The end result is a three-way tie in the MotoGP Championship standings, and a season that is really starting to brim with excitement.
It was a close qualify session in the outskirts of Barcelona today, but at the end of the day Jorge Lorenzo pulled a squeaker of a session on Valentino Rossi to take the pole in front of his home crowd.
Wearing special livery for the day, which paid homage to Barcelona FC (the local soccer team), Lorenzo lapped a 1’41.974 on the Catalan track, just .013 seconds quicker than Rossi’s best effort. This news surely pleased Team Fiat-Yamaha, as once again they’ll have a 1-2 start on the grid for tomorrow’s race.
250GP World Champion Marco Simoncelli turned down offers last year to move up to MotoGP in favor of instead defending his title, but the young Italian rider has now announced that he intends on racing in MotoGP for 2010. While the Simoncelli has not been signed to a team, and no official interest has been made, the Italian seems to see the move as an certainty.
Colin Edwards has to be one of our favorite motorcycle racers, primarily for the epic races he would put on for us while racing in the World Superbike Championship against Troy Bayliss. Since his move to MotoGP, Edwards has been less of a talking point for his racing prowess, and instead usually for controversies associated with him.
First it was the Aprilia RS3 “Cube” that had a propensity to catch on fire. Then, it was playing second fiddle to Valentino Rossi. And lately, it has been the Tech3 antics between himself and James Toseland.
Love him, hate him, discount him, but Colin always has one consistency: telling things exactly the way he sees them. In a recent interview with Riders (an Italian Magazine) Colin did just that.
Edwards fielded some colorful questions about sex, his favorite porn starts, as well as some political topics like gay marriage, and gun control. We didn’t think you wanted to hear any of that though. Continue reading after the jump for some of the more calmer questions, and Colin’s to the point answers.
