Valentino Rossi breaks 50 points clear after title rival Casey Stoner crashes out of Czech Republic Grand Prix lead. Valentino Rossi moved two races clear at the top of the 2008 MotoGP World Championship with his fifth win of the season at Brno on Sunday - the Fiat Yamaha star enjoying an easy ride home after title rival Casey Stoner fell from the lead on lap seven.
Rossi, starting from second on the grid behind Stoner, lost time on the first lap getting past John Hopkins - and looked in danger of allowing the reigning world champion to escape - but the Italian soon found his rhythm and, after halting Stoner's advance at just over one second, had starting to reel in the young Australian when he crashed out.
"I was confident because my bike was fast from Friday practice, and with Jeremy [Burgess] we made a small modification to the front after warm-up to allow me to be a bit faster in some sections, and it worked very well," explained Rossi.
"I lost about half a second getting past Hopkins at the start and Casey was incredibly fast at that stage, like he'd already done ten laps!
"For a short time I was worried but then, after two laps, I understood that my bike was working very well and that I was fast enough to try to catch him. I had closed a little bit already and gradually the red bike was becoming a bit bigger in front of me, and I think this is when he started to push harder and made his mistake.
"I was anticipating a very hard battle if I did catch him, so when I saw the red bike slide out I could hardly believe it - this made things a lot easier for me!" smiled the Italian.
Indeed, the pair had already opened out an eleven second gap from the chasing pack by the time of Stoner's accident and Rossi was left to ride the remaining 15 laps alone, eventually finishing 15 seconds clear of Toni Elias.
"After [Stoner's fall] I just enjoyed riding my bike; my Bridgestone tyres worked very well until the end and my M1 felt very good. Of course I can't count this as a complete victory because Casey fell, and I am sorry for him, but this is racing and I have to be happy with this result," he said.
No comments:
Post a Comment