Championship leader Jorge Lorenzo continued his phenomenal form today, by winning Round 10 of the MotoGP Championship in Brno. This signalled the young Spaniards first win at the Czech circuit, and his 7th of the season. The FIAT Yamaha rider added another 25 points to his tally after starting in 3rd on the grid.
Repsol Honda’s Dani Pedrosa had a good start off the line from pole, as did Monster Yamaha Tech 3’s Ben Spies who started 2nd. As the riders approached the first corner, Lorenzo bolted into the lead, but couldn’t shake the rest of the field as Pedrosa, Spies and Ducati’s Casey Stoner gave chase. Lorenzo’s team-mate Valentino Rossi had an awful start from 5th on the grid, slipping back as far as 8th, and could not recover.
Rizla Suzuki’s Loris Capirossi fell early on, after being hit by another rider. The collision knocked his clutch lever out of place. After attempting to hit it back into place himself, the veteran Italian lost concentration and went too deep into a corner causing him to spill it into the gravel. Repsol Honda’s Andrea Dovizioso was very lucky after losing the front end going into turn 9 too quickly and lost it in the middle of the track. Luckily the field managed to avoid him, and he continued for a few more laps before retiring.
Back at the front Lorenzo was beginning to stretch out his lead from Pedrosa and as they crossed the line he had a 5.494s lead from his fellow countryman. Stoner held on to 3rd place, and Ben Spies ended the race in a respectable 4th. Rossi battled his way up to 5th after spending half the race battling with Ducati’s Nicky Hayden. Spies’ team-mate Colin Edwards finished in 7th and 8th was grabbed by San Carlo Honda Gresini Team’s Marco Melandri. Héctor Barberá ended in 9th and the returning Randy de Puniet completing the top ten on his LCR Honda machine.
A frustrating weekend was made even worse for Rizla Suzuki’s Ãlvaro Bautista as he slid out on the last corner of the final lap, having just passed Marco Simoncelli who took 11th.
