Monday, July 7, 2008

Final push for Fiat Yamaha

From Yamaha Racing

The Fiat Yamaha Team faces the first half of a transatlantic doubleheader this weekend as the MotoGP World Championship heads to Germany for the 10th round of the season, followed immediately by a trip to the USA for round 11. The two races are separated by just seven days and a distance of some 9,400 kilometres, representing a gruelling final push before the four-week summer break.

The Sachsenring circuit traditionally produces close racing and Valentino Rossi has unsurprisingly been involved over recent years, starring in some of the most exciting MotoGP race finishes of all time. The most memorable was in 2006, when the Italian stormed from 11th on the grid on his Yamaha to lead home the closest top-four ever in MotoGP, separated as they were by just 0.307 seconds.

Rossi, who is set to break Max Biaggi's record of 201 consecutive Grand Prix appearances this weekend, has had three other victories at Sachsenring in all classes and he is keen to add to that tally as the season crosses its midseason equator with Dani Pedrosa on the top of the standings - just four points clear of the Italian.

"Last year in Sachsenring I made a mistake and crashed, and at the last race in Assen I also made a mistake, so I hope that I've now had my bad moment for this year," Rossi said. "Sachsenring has been a great track for me in the past and it's a great place to race at; it's very tight and twisty but it generally suits the Yamaha very well. We are going there having lost our championship lead but we're only four points behind so the situation is certainly much better than it was at this point last season."

Rossi took time out of his training schedule last weekend to visit Misano for Yamaha Fest, where he was joined for the first time by his Fiat Yamaha team-mate Jorge Lorenzo. After recovering his confidence with two sixth place finishes in the last two rounds, the 21-year-old Mallorcan is relaxed and ready to re-ignite his challenge for the top positions at a circuit where he has only once previously made the podium, in the 250cc race in 2006.

"I have recently started to train normally again after a gap of two months, which has been quite hard for me and I have been very tired lately," Lorenzo said. "Since the accident in China I haven't been able to use the exercise bike or do proper cardiovascular work until last week, so I am just having to take my regime step-by-step to try to build my strength; I know that building my fitness back up is the best way to return to my former level.

"Even though it's been a hard time for me through the last two months I think that the crashes have made me stronger mentally; when you win it's easy but when things are going badly, this is when you learn more about yourself and this is very important to make you a better competitor. For the next race I have to keep trying to build my confidence with the bike."

Located in the heartland of the former East Germany's once glorious motorcycle racing industry, the Sachsenring is built right next to the old road course, a characteristic the track shares with Brno in the nearby Czech Republic. The second shortest track on the calendar features a series of tight and relatively slow corners juxtaposed with some dazzlingly fast ones - including a stomach-churning downhill right hander which was added in 2003.

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