All I going to say about this one (for now) is that you need to watch it.  Eventful is the best description i can come up with in summery.  A new first time winner, almost an American on top the box and bunny ears.  The Podium Pics will be unusual for sure!

For the second time in 8 days Jakub Kornfeil produced a perfect victory and with Red Bull MotoGP Rookies Cup rival Sturla Fagerhaug crashing out again the 16 year old Czech goes into his home race tied on points with the 17 year old Norwegian. Spanish 17 year old Daniel Ruiz rode a great race to second in Britain ahead of 14 year old Japanese Daijiro Hiura who also put himself into Cup contention. Hiura is 18 points behind Kornfeil and Fagerhaug with 50 points at stake for the double header that wraps up the season. The top 7 riders in the Cup can still win it.

While Kornfeil matched his German wet weather disappearing act with an almost identical performance in glorious sunshine at Donington the entertainment was provided by an incredible battle for second. As Pole man Danny Kent faded through the pack to finish an eventual 8th it was the two Frenchman Florian Marino and Nelson Major who bashed elbows in second allowing Jake Gagne, Mathew Scholtz, Hiura and Ruiz to close and make it a 6 man battle for second.

Just as he did at the Sachsenring, Kornfeil reeled off perfect laps and soon had a 3 second lead while those behind slowed each other with the line-steeling and out-braking. As things settled down slightly there were many laps when Kornfeil was not the quickest man on the track but as the pursuers swapped that advantage between them they lost ground as a group.

The situation was only reversed when Ruiz pushed his way into second and broke away. That was lap 12 of 17 though and by then the story was written. Kornfeil had more than 3 seconds in hand and though Ruiz took a few tenths out of him every lap the Czech just kept his head and enough of an advantage to cross the line 2.4 seconds ahead.

“It was almost a perfect race for me but not easy.” said Kornfeil. “From the start I was happy to see that once I got ahead my lead was getting bigger and bigger but I wasn’t happy in the middle of the race when they started closing again. I just couldn’t do the lap-time I wanted. There was nothing wrong with the tires or the bike it was just in my head I think. Still I am happy with the win and I am happy that the last races are in Brno.”

Ruiz has been frustrated so often this year but finally things worked out as he raced through from 20th place on the grid. “I think I was just so relaxed because I didn’t expect anything from this race. I really enjoyed it though and as I was passing the other guys I just felt comfortable. I was happy to get away from the group into a clear second but by then Jakub was just too far in front.”

Hiura remains frustrated even though he made the rostrum for the 4th time. “I am still not winning so I can’t be happy. I am going to have to do that in Brno.”

It was Jake Gagne who looked as though he was set for his third podium in as many races as the 15 year old Californian was the first to break free of that second place battle. That was mid race but the advantage only lasted a couple of corners. “I’d been a bit frustrated by all the crazy overtaking moves in the group so I was happy to get out front. Trouble was I then ran over the kerb and got a bit loose. That put me back and I think I then tried a bit too hard, made some mistakes and couldn’t get in front again.”

There were some pretty ‘interesting’ moves in that pack. Hiura and Marino tried for the same piece of track at the right-hand hairpin and both were lucky to remain upright. It was getting clear of that kind of action that gave Ruiz 2nd place.

For Fagerhaug, who seemed to already have one hand on the Cup, Donington was a race to forget as he crashed out on lap 3. “I went onto the back straight too tight, close to the kerb, the front wheel jumped up and I lost the front. It’s a shame because I didn’t go into the corner too fast, I just pulled a tight line to get a good drive out and I crashed as I hit the bump. In Brno… I’m not going to crash again. I love that track, hopefully it’s going to be a good one.”

Valentino Rossi took pole for the second race running at Donington Park this afternoon, his fourth of the season and the 56th of his career. Jorge Lorenzo qualified third and, with four poles for him also this year, the Fiat Yamaha Team has now taken the front grid slot in eight out of the ten races. It is also the fifth consecutive race at which both riders have been on the front row.

After yesterday’s downpours, today was dry with sunny intervals and this morning saw Lorenzo second and Rossi third as they got their first chance to work on their dry settings around the 4km track. In this afternoon’s hour-long qualifying session Lorenzo held pole position for most of the session until briefly surrendering it to Dani Pedrosa ten minutes from the end, whilst Rossi struggled slightly to find the best set-up with the hard Bridgestone tire.

22-year-old Lorenzo moved back to the top just a couple of laps later but was then edged off by Rossi with three minutes to go, as the Italian found his best form at the perfect time. The Spaniard was unable to match the pace of his championship-leading team-mate with the soft tire and finished 0.286 seconds adrift, whilst a strong charge from Dani Pedrosa edged the Spaniard into third but was not good enough to knock Rossi off pole.

Tomorrow’s race will start at the later time of 1530 local time, which is 1630 CET.

Valentino Rossi – Position: 1st Time: 1′28.116 Laps: 32
“I am quite surprised to be on pole today because we had a couple of problems this afternoon! This morning unfortunately we didn’t try the hard Bridgestone tire but we weren’t worried because everyone else had good grip with it. But this afternoon when we finally tried it we found the grip to be not as we expected and our pace with it wasn’t so good. We made some modifications and improved it a bit, then we made a few more and used the soft tire again and then we were very quick. Like that I could ride the bike how I wanted and it felt great, fast and flowing so this was a good job from the team. We need to do some work to improve our pace with the hard tire, and then we just have to wait and see what the weather does tomorrow. Whatever happens, we’re starting from the front and this is the most important thing.”

Jorge Lorenzo – Position: 3rd Time: 1′28.402 Laps: 35
“With the harder tire, we’re definitely ready and I feel very good on the bike. With the softer tire and on my last run I wasn’t so fast, but we are not too concerned about this. Anyway I feel confident on my M1 and I am enjoying riding here. Tomorrow we don’t know about the weather but I was fast also in the rain yesterday so I know that I can be competitive even if the weather is bad. I am really hoping for a good race here since it’s the last time we will come.”

Davide Brivio – Team Manager
“At the end everything worked out okay and we got a nice pole position, the second in a row. We still have some work to do to improve the race setting to finalise the package in case we have dry conditions tomorrow, but we have the warm-up in to try to fine-tune everything. It looks like it’s more likely that it’s going to rain however, in which case we will use what we learned yesterday.”

Daniele Romagnoli – Team Manager
“We are on target, because starting from the front row will be very important for this race. Today we concentrated mostly on our race setting and Jorge’s pace is very fast and consistent. Maybe we should have considered something a bit different for qualifying with the softer tire, but the most important thing is that we’re in good shape for the race. We hope that we can have the same weather as today tomorrow, but if the rain does come then we have yesterday’s good session to help us.”

Edwards and Toseland confident ahead of British battle
Monster Yamaha Tech 3 Team duo Colin Edwards and James Toseland will do battle in the last British MotoGP race to be staged at Donington Park from sixth and ninth on the grid respectively.

Edwards secured his seventh top six qualifying result of the season with a best lap of 1.28.865, the American using dry and warm conditions to further evaluate new front fork settings and a revised body position on his Yamaha YZR-M1 machine.

Bidding to score a third MotoGP podium at Donington Park in tomorrow’s 30-lap race, Edwards was one of only seven riders to lap within a second of Valentino Rossi’s impressive pole position pace.

Toseland gave his hopes of a scoring a top six finish in front of a passionate home crowd a huge boost this afternoon. Working closely with his Monster Yamaha Tech 3 Team crew to improve the setting of his YZR-M1 machine, the 28-year-old performed superbly to equal his best qualifying result of the season.

A lap of 1.29.270s was just 1.154s away from pole position and Toseland was just over four-tenths-of-a-second away from a top six spot on the grid after he’d been as high as fifth position on the timesheets.

The British rider is confident of fighting for his best result of the season, though all eyes will be on the skies tomorrow, with a repeat of the rain that disrupted yesterday’s practice forecast for the race.

Colin Edwards – Position: 6th Time: 1′28.865 Laps: 30
“I’m happy with the way I rode but getting close to those guys at the front is getting tough. They are running a pretty fast pace but I’m confident if I can get a good start that I’ll be able to stay with them for the race. If I can get away with them then they might pull me around for a few laps. I’m moving in the right direction with the setting and the changes we’ve made to the front forks and experimenting with my body position has improved the front feeling. But with no testing now it is difficult to get used to something so different quickly and I just need a bit more time to adapt because I know we can make the feeling much better. I’m still not sure which race tire I’m going to run. I’d like to have the best of both compounds on one tire. We need the left side of the softer tire and the right side of the hard one. But deliberating that might be for nothing because I hear we’re probably going to be under water here tomorrow anyway on rain tires. We got some time in the rain yesterday so I’m happy I’ve got a set-up for rain or dry conditions. I really want a good result with it being the last British GP at Donington Park. I’ve had a lot of success here in the past and it would be good to sign off in style.”

James Toseland – Position 9th Time: 1′29.270 Laps: 30
“I’m happy but at the same time a little bit frustrated because we didn’t have a really good base setting this morning. That meant we had quite a bit of work to do this afternoon, but thanks to my guys because they did a great job again. I improved quite a bit but if we had started this morning like we ended this afternoon then I’m sure I could have qualified on the second row. The base set-up didn’t work so well because we were too hard on the front and rear. I didn’t have much feel at all and I was only doing low 1.32s, so to do 1.29s this afternoon I’m really happy. At least I’ve given myself a good chance of battling for that top six tomorrow and that was always my target. Today was definitely better than last year’s qualifying, although it couldn’t really have been much worse. The new electronics are working brilliantly round here, particularly out of the slow hairpins at the end of the lap, so I’ve got say thanks to Yamaha for that again. Obviously I’m desperate t o get a good result tomorrow. I want to make amends for the disappointment of last year and give the British fans something to cheer about. The support out there today was amazing, and they deserve a good result. I can promise them I’ll be giving it my absolute maximum.”

LCR Honda MotoGP rider Randy De Puniet will start tomorrow’s UK Grand Prix from the fourth row following today’s qualifying session at Donington Park race track which hosts the tenth round of the season before 2-weeks summer break. The French rider rode his Honda RC212V to the 10th place with a best lap time of 1’29.434 as he could not take a big advantage from the soft tires at the 4.023 Km race track.

After yesterday’s mixed conditions opening day of the British GP, this morning free session was conducted in the dry and the hour long qualifying session was ridden in the same condition with ambience temperature of 21°C (31°C on the asphalt). However the 28-year-old was unable to feel comfortable on the bike as he is not a fan of the British track. Today’s poleman is Rossi followed by Pedrosa and Lorenzo.
De Puniet – 10th – 1’29.434

De Puniet -10th: “Well … it hasn’t been an easy day for me and I always struggle to set my pace on this track especially in the last two corners. Since the beginning of this week end we had some issues to understand why we could not keep the pace of the front group. We have been focused in the last part of the track because that’s where it seems we lost too much time. We tried to improve the machine between the two sessions and I did my best to suit my riding stile to these corners for winning some tenths. Honestly we expected a third row start but I am still hoping for a top eight end”.

Pedrosa lead the time sheets yesterday and again today but by the end of the final Qualifying session at Donington Park today it’s Rossi who sets the fastest lap.  He’s impressive that’s for sure, Pedrosa manages to split the Yamaha’s and Stoner gets pushed to fourth.

Final Qualifying Results:

MotoGP Free Practice Two:

I get a little choked-up when i think we may not see these great images / Pics from Donington Park anymore.  As it stands MotoGP is done at Donington after this event.  Cherish them…

Images complements of: Ducati Press,Yamaha Press and Suzuki Motorsport

Rizla Suzuki’s first day race preparations were forced to take a back seat this afternoon as the British summertime weather intervened at Donington Park.

Loris Capirossi (P11, 1′40.419, 25 laps) was left frustrated at the lack of dry track time today, something that he knows is vital in getting the GSV-R ready for Sunday’s race. He is still confident though that if tomorrow stays fine he will be able to get the bike prepared and competitive for Sunday’s 30-lap race.

A huge rain storm shortly before the start of the hour-long session left the 4,023m circuit very wet with many areas of standing water, but as the wind dried the track out it made using the correct tire and making any in-roads into getting good data very difficult. Chris Vermeulen (P14, 1′41.467, 22 laps) was able to use the very wettest part of the session to the full and was pleased with the progress he made in finding a good set-up for his Suzuki GSV-R if the conditions are similar on race-day.

Rizla Suzuki has already had a successful time at the British GP due to a team representing the squad taking first place in the ‘Question of Bikes’ competition that was part of the ‘Riders for Health Day of Champions’ yesterday. Three members of the Rizla Suzuki team competed against other teams in the quiz held on the main stage, before returning triumphant for the second year in succession. Rizla Suzuki also presented a cheque to ‘Riders for Health’ for €7500, donated by Suzuki Germany from the sale of a replica Rizla Suzuki GSX-R1000. The team also contributed to the money raised by offering a VIP experience for this weekend’s British MotoGP during the auction at Donington last night. This was sold for €8,800 to Graham Rees and helped boost the overall figures for the charity that stood at €205,135 at the end of the event.

Rizla Suzuki MotoGP will be back in action on-track tomorrow morning for the final free practice session, followed by qualifying in the afternoon. The race will start at the later time this Sunday, as the Rizla Suzuki riders and the whole field will wait for the lights to change to signal the off at 15.30 local time (14.30 GMT).

Loris Capirossi:

“As I have said before, we need to have time on the bike to get it set-up the best for us. It seems that we keep getting really difficult weather that isn’t helping us at all. Today we used a wet tire for the whole session and at the end 85% of the track was dry and the rest was wet so it was difficult to be able to get anything done. We can hope that the weather is better tomorrow so we can work on the bike and if we can I am sure we will be in a good position for Sunday.”

Chris Vermeulen:

“It was really strange conditions out there today, but I guess you could say that is just normal British weather! We had a huge downpour at the start of the session and the track was very wet and quite slippery. We worked hard – and quickly – on getting a good wet setting while the track was still wet and the bike worked well in those conditions. At the end the track dried a lot so we just tested some small things that didn’t really rely on fast lap-times, which was useful because with how the track was there wasn’t a lot else to be learnt out there. At the end I came in a bit early because the track had dried out in most places, but there was still a couple of wet patches and it seemed a bit too dangerous for slicks.”

Paul Denning – Team Manager:

“I don’t think that there will be much that any rider or team will have learned from that session with the weather changing so much over the hour. For most of the session neither the wet nor the slick tire was the appropriate choice. Having said that, when the track was at its wettest Chris was able to take a big step with the bike setting and Loris also managed to get a feel and some essential data from his machine.”

Round 10 Great Britain GP Friday practice report

Bridgestone compounds available: Front: Wets – Soft. Slicks – Soft, Medium        Rear: Wets – Soft. Slicks – Soft, Medium

For the second weekend in a row Bridgestone’s wet tires were put to the test by changeable weather conditions, this time at Donington Park. The hour-long first free practice session started with heavy rain and a very wet track following a midday downpour, but by the end a dry line had emerged around most of the lap.

Repsol Honda’s Dani Pedrosa finished at the top of the timesheets, recording his fastest lap on his last of the session. Second was Ducati Team’s Casey Stoner, who also set his fastest time on his last fast lap. As the track became continually drier, every rider recorded their best effort right at the end of the session.

All riders used the soft Bridgestone wet tire for the duration of the session. The only rider to run on slick tires was Hayate Racing’s Marco Melandri, who did so in the closing moments. The Italian opted for the soft compound slicks right at the end of the session, but he did not have sufficient time to record a fast lap before being shown the chequered flag.

All riders completed the session using just one set of tires, and Briton James Toseland demonstrated the durability of the Bridgestone wets by completing a 30-lap stint on a single set, equalling Sunday’s race distance.

Tohru Ubukata – Bridgestone Motorsport – Manager Motorcycle Race tire Development
“In just one session we saw all conditions from heavy rain and standing water to a dry line round almost all the circuit and I am very pleased that our wet tire was able to perform well throughout. In such varied conditions, our wet tires were really able to demonstrate their wide operating range, working well in all conditions as the track’s grip characteristics continually changed. Our focus has been to make our tires this year work over as wide a range of conditions as possible, and I am satisfied this afternoon that we have achieved this.

“The warm up performance our wet tires showed in the very wet conditions was good, and they also proved their durability in almost dry conditions so I am very happy. By the end of the session just the two hairpins in sector four were still wet and this is why our wet tire was favoured by all riders.”

Maybe a surprise, maybe not.  Danny Pedrosa leads the lap chart on this somewhat solemn occasion in GP racing.  I’m really not surprised, the Honda has shown speed for some time now and the long anticipated return to health of Pedrosa can only be bad news for the Yamaha and Ducati camps.  For us (the true race fans) not clinging to any brand or rider but to the love of the battle, i would call it good news!