Lorenzo feels the need for speed

The new Spanish circuit contains a long, downhill, back straight, where fellow front row starters Casey Stoner (Ducati, pole) and Dani Pedrosa (Honda, 3rd) were able to reach 324.5km/h and 326.8km/h respectively in qualifying.

Despite qualifying second on the grid, Lorenzo was only able to reach 318.6km/h on the straight, and also feels he's losing out to his main rivals under acceleration.

Acceleration isn't measured by MotoGP organisers, but in terms of top speedLorenzo was faster than only one rider this afternoon - Tech 3 Yamaha's Ben Spies. 

All four M1s were in the bottom five for top speed in qualifying, with only Honda's Marco Simoncelli slower than a Yamaha.

"I'm riding good and every lap I improve my riding style and understand the track, which is not so easy," began Lorenzo, after extending his run of successive front row MotoGP starts to 15.

"The problem is that we lose a lot on the straights and under acceleration. We don't have the same power as the Ducati and Honda, so this is the worst point we have now. 

"But anyway we can't change the bike, so with this bike we must be perfect and ride perfectly to have some more chance of victory or a podium tomorrow."

Lorenzo starts round 13 with a 63 point lead over Pedrosa and has finished on the podium at every round this year.

Lorenzo breaks pole drought at Silverstone

The sole factory Yamaha rider after team-mate Valentino Rossi broke a leg last time out in Italy, a superb end to the long Silverstone lap saw Lorenzo take pole from Honda riders Randy de Puniet and Dani Pedrosa with three minutes to go.

de Puniet and Pedrosa then both crashed on their final laps, confirming Lorenzo's tenth pole in MotoGP and the 36th of his career.

"I am so happy about this first pole of the season, but I'm even happier about the fact that I felt so good on my M1 this afternoon,” said Lorenzo, who starts round five 25-points in front of Mugello winner Pedrosa.

“It is really important to be on the front row for tomorrow because this gives us the best chance of another podium.

“Today we did 18 consecutive laps with the hard tyre and then another eight with the soft, which is a good sign, but the track was quite cold today and it took time for the tyres to reach the right temperature, so we have to wait and see how the weather is for our final choice.

“I feel comfortable and I'm really looking forward to tomorrow, although I hope it isn't going to rain,” he added.

"I've said before that it's sometimes better not to be on pole because then there's less pressure, but today we are on pole and we're really happy about it!” confessed team manager Wilco Zeelenberg.

“Jorge worked very hard in the first 13 or 14 laps, pushing hard to learn the track and understand the limits, and this paid off for him. de Puniet and Pedrosa were fast but they both crashed, but Jorge was fast and finished safely.

“There are of course no points for pole and we have to see what tomorrow brings but it's nice to have a rider who is fit and doing fast lap times and a bike that's consistent. We're hoping for another good race tomorrow."

Pedrosa was taken to the medical centre after hurting his legs, but is expected to race.

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Rossi: Lorenzo and Stoner out of reach

 

 

The Italian legend, riding in his second race back from a broken leg, qualified sixth on the grid, 0.710sec from pole but less than a tenth behind third-placed Andrea Dovizioso (Repsol Honda).

Rossi, who finished fourth last weekend at Sachsenring, is finding the Californian racetrack tougher on his injuries than the German venue had been- and it is the shoulder he injured back in April that is causing the most problems.

"We didn't go too badly today but we need to improve our setting a little bit to get closer to the leaders. Lorenzo and Stoner are very fast but after that there are a few riders quite close together, including me, so it's not too bad," said Rossi after qualifying.

"I think it's going to be very difficult tomorrow because this track is a lot harder for me than Sachsenring, but I hope I can do a good race. There are a few corners where we know we can be a bit faster so tomorrow morning we will try to make some small changes to the setting to allow that, then I need to get a good start. 

"My leg feels better than yesterday, which is good, the problem today is the shoulder because my left one isn't strong enough to compensate completely for the lack of power in my right one and now I have some pain in both! 

"My hope for tomorrow is to be able to finish the race without too much pain and to do the best we can in the circumstances."

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Lorenzo wins US GP, Pedrosa falls from lead

 

The Fiat Yamaha rider claimed his sixth win from nine races after nearest title rivalDani Pedrosa crashed out of the lead on lap 12 of 32, just as Lorenzo was beginning to put the Repsol Honda rider under pressure. 

Pedrosa had shot from fourth on the grid to first with a brave outside-line over the crest into the turn two hairpin, with Lorenzo in third behind Ducati's Casey Stonerby the end of the first lap. 

Stoner surrendered second to Lorenzo when he ran wide on lap six, just as Pedrosa looked in danger of breaking clear at the front. 

Lorenzo then began to claw time back from his fellow Spaniard, and was 0.6sec behind when Pedrosa saw his hopes of victory end in a cloud of dust after a lowside fall. 

The accident marked Pedrosa's first non-finish of the year and has at least delayed his hopes of scoring three wins in one season for the very first time in MotoGP. Pedrosa will have plenty more chances to do that, but the title damage may prove irreparable. 

Thereafter, Lorenzo slowly edged away from Stoner - who backed off after several front-end scares - to win by 3.517sec. 

The #99 celebrated by changing into a NASA-type spacesuit and doing a mock moonwalk before planting his Lorenzo Land flag at the top of the corkscrew. 

 

Lorenzo takes seventh victory at Brno

 

 

Jorge Lorenzo has extended his MotoGP title lead to 77 points, over three race wins, after claiming his seventh victory from ten starts in Sunday's Czech Republic Grand Prix at Brno.

 

Jorge Lorenzo delivered an inch-perfect performance to record his seventh victory of the MotoGP season in the Czech Grand Prix on Sunday.

The 23-year-old Spaniard now holds a 77-point lead over his nearest title-rival Dani Pedrosa - who finished second. That means Lorenzo now holds an advantage of three entire race wins, with just eight rounds of the MotoGP world championship left to run.

 

With typical panache, Lorenzo forced his way into the lead with a brave move that saw him pass the fast-starting Pedrosa and Ben Spies at the same time into Turn 3.

 

From that point on, he never looked back.

And while that brief kerfuffle saw Pedrosa slip behind Spies, it wasn't long before the Honda was back on the tail of Lorenzo. The Majorcan put up with this pursuit until around lap 10, before thumping in a series of flying laps that saw the gap extended by 4s.

 

By lap 15 (of 22), the fight at the front was over, and Lorenzo was clear to take yet another dominant victory. He has still not finished lower than second this season.

 

Casey Stoner eventually finished a distant third having caught and passed Spies before half distance. Behind that pair Valentino Rossi recover from a poor getaway to finish fifth, 18s behind his team-mate and third of the four Yamaha riders.

 

Rossi was assisted in this battle by Andrea Dovizioso crashing out of fifth on the second factory Honda. The Italian was annoyed at himself afterwards, having ended up prone in the middle of the track. Indeed he was lucky to have escaped unscathed as the field swept left and right of him.

Nicky Hayden rode bravely to sixth, despite having chipped his left radius bone less than 24 hours prior to the race, though the Ducati man had no chance of hanging on to Rossi.

 

Colin Edwards finished a lonely seventh ahead of Marco Melandri who came out on top of an enthralling battle between himself, Hector Barbera and MM's Gresini team-mate Marco Simoncelli in the final laps. In fact such was the intensity of the scrap, that even the hobbled Randy de Puniet got involved - stealing 10th from Simoncelli in the process.

 

There was misfortune for Suzuki with both Loris Capirossi and the injured Alvaro Bautista crashing out. The Spaniard fell on the last lap, having grimaced throughout with a back injury picked up in practice. 

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