Valentino-Rossi
Italy, Sunday Sep 14th 2014 – The home crowd went wild at Misano as Valentino Rossi took his first victory since Assen last year, with Jorge Lorenzo and Dani Pedrosa also on the podium, whilst Marc Marquez finished 15th after a crash.
Nine time World Champion Rossi (Movistar Yamaha MotoGP) took the lead in the early laps after getting in front of pole man Lorenzo and then asserting his authority in an early battle with Marquez. On the 10th lap Marquez went down at Rio corner when in second place and whilst he restarted his RC213V he could not achieve more than a solitary point.
Valentino Rossi, Movistar Yamaha MotoGP – “I’m very happy to win today, especially here at Misano in front of my fans, family and friends. During the practice sessions, our Yamaha and my team were working very well and I felt that we had a small advantage at Misano. Yesterday and today I felt very strong and knew I could fight for the victory, but realised it would be a tough fight with the other riders. I gave my maximum at the beginning of the race and knew that if I could resist the other riders I had a chance as my pace was good, and in the end I couldn’t want for anything more from today.”
Jorge Lorenzo 2nd – “It’s been a tough race for me because we finally took a risk with the harder tyre. I’m happy with another podium but a bit disappointed because we thought we could fight for the victory. Right at the beginning, despite a good start I felt the front tyre didn’t give me the confidence to lean and also on braking. In Brno we risked also changing the tyre and the result was good but here we struggled much more. For me it was impossible to get the victory. Even if I tried to push at the maximum, when I saw Marc crash, I knew Valentino had a better pace today. Valentino had a perfect weekend at home and he deserved the win, it’s unbelievable at the age of 35! I’m also happy for the team because it’s been a long time without a 1-2. All the Yamaha guys are working really well and the bike is more competitive race by race. I would like to win too but we will have to wait.”
Rossi kept the hammer down at the front to eventually win by 1.578s and reach the milestone of 5000 Grand Prix points in style. It is the 107th victory of Rossi’s remarkable career.
Dani Pedrosa 3rd -“Today’s race was a very difficult one, and it was hard to do any more. Marc [Marquez] attempted to keep up with Valentino [Rossi] and Jorge [Lorenzo] but eventually he crashed trying –they were very strong here. This race also saw many problems for us with the front and rear, so there was little that we could do. From the opening laps I lost a lot of time in traffic, and that affected my entire race. I tried to do the best I could and still had difficulty sticking with Dovizioso, because he also lapped very quickly; eventually we were going as fast as the Valentino and Jorge. Now we have to take the positives from this weekend and hope that for the next race at Aragon, which is a track that I like, we have a better feeling and have a better race.”
Marc Marquez 15th -“I’m happy with how today went, despite the crash due to my first mistake of the season, because yesterday I did not think that I would be capable of sticking with the Valentino [Rossi] and Jorge [Lorenzo]. They had a little bit more pace, and today we were able to get fairly close to them. I saw the possibility of fighting with Valentino for the victory, but that was not possible in the end because of the mistake; I was riding over the inside of the rumble strip and that meant that I lost the front. Luckily I was able to rejoin the race, continue with a good pace and score a point that could always come in handy in the future.”
Lorenzo rode with determination to take another podium result and finished in second place for the fourth successive race.
Coming from fifth on the grid, Pedrosa (Repsol Honda Team) took his ninth podium finish of the season in third place, crossing the line 1.234s ahead of the hard working Andrea Dovizioso (Ducati Team).
It was another good ride for Dovizioso in front of the home crowd as he got the Ducati across the finish line 5.5s behind winner Rossi. Likewise, Andrea Iannone (Pramac Racing) impressed in fifth place with another solid result.
Rookie Pol Espargaro (Monster Yamaha Tech3) rode well again to secure sixth place, 4.1s ahead of his teammate Bradley Smith.
Alvaro Bautista (GO&FUN Honda Gresini), Cal Crutchlow (Ducati Team) and Yonny Hernandez (Energy T.I. Pramac Racing) completed the top ten.
Mike Di Meglio (Avintia Racing) was an early crasher, as was Danilo Petrucci (Octo IodaRacing Team). Di Meglio suffered a displaced fracture of the fourth and fifth metacarpus of his left hand and will require surgery. Stefan Bradl (LCR Honda MotoGP) also fell out of the top ten. Aleix Espargaro (NGM Forward Racing) crashed on the final lap. All the riders other than Di Meglio were uninjured.
Race Results – Marco Simoncelli, San Marino 14/09/2014
1 Valentino Rossi Yamaha ITA 44’14.586
2 Jorge Lorenzo Yamaha ESP 0’01.578
3 Daniel Pedrosa Honda ESP 0’04.276
4 Andrea Dovizioso Ducati ITA 0’05.510
5 Andrea Iannone Ducati ITA 0’11.771
6 Pol Espargaro Yamaha ESP 0’18.999
7 Bradley Smith Yamaha GBR 0’23.100
8 Alvaro Bautista Honda ESP 0’36.458
9 Cal Crutchlow Ducati GBR 0’38.480
10 Yonny Hernandez Ducati COL 0’45.878
11 Karel Abraham Honda CZE 0’54.765
12 Hiroshi Aoyama Honda JPN 0’56.775
13 Scott Redding Honda GBR 1’02.734
14 Alex De Angelis Yamaha SMR 1’13.546
15 Marc Marquez Honda ESP 1’15.948
