Top step of the podium for patriotic Pedrosa

DANI PEDROSA, REPSOL HONDA
Race Position: First                         Championship Position: Second

“WE ARE BACK WINNING RACES AND IT’S A GREAT FEELING”
Repsol Honda rider Dani Pedrosa rode immaculately to secure a dominant win in the German Grand Prix, setting the five fastest laps of a shortened race at the Sachsenring and setting a new lap record along the way. It was Pedrosa’s second victory of the 2010 season and his tenth since he moved up to the MotoGP class with Repsol Honda in 2006. The win for the 24-year-old Spaniard closed the gap in the World Championship standings by five points to Jorge Lorenzo, who finished second today. Pedrosa and his Honda RC212V looked very strong all weekend at the Sachsenring and were clearly the fastest combination this afternoon. In the first part of the race Pedrosa and Lorenzo took off at the front, with Lorenzo fractions of a second ahead when the red flag came out on lap 10 after a crash involving Randy De Puniet, Alvaro Bautista, and Aleix Espargaro, during which De Puniet was unfortunate to suffer a broken leg. At the restart, Pedrosa took the lead into the first corner and led lap one before being demoted by Lorenzo to second place, where he stayed in close attendance for eight more laps. At the end of lap nine, Pedrosa made his decisive move, getting a better drive out of the final corner and sliding alongside Lorenzo on the start-finish straight before holding a tight line into turn one. From that moment, he never looked back and relentlessly stretched away at the front to win by 3.355s. On the podium, Pedrosa wore the shirt of the Spanish national football team in homage to Spain’s victory in the World Cup final in South Africa.

“I’m very happy because we are back winning races and it’s a great feeling. It wasn’t easy because when the race is stopped and restarted like that, sometimes you don’t have the same feeling on the machine in the second part. Also, you get nervous again on the grid and it’s possible you won’t have the same pace after the restart. But it went very well for us in both races. In the first one, I was very close to Lorenzo and the pace was good, but then they stopped the race and we looked at each other saying, “Why?” It was even better in the second part. We just made one small change with the rear suspension to get a bit more traction, but we didn’t change the tyre because we didn’t have any new tyres left; we went with the same ones. I made another good start and in the first laps after Lorenzo had passed me I was pushing very to try to take him back. I couldn’t do it with my first attempt, but when I got a second chance, I just went for it. Then it was a great feeling to stretch ahead and get the victory - the team deserve it. This victory is even better than the one in Italy because at Mugello I just went away in front and there was no battle with anybody, but here I was battling with Lorenzo in the first and second race, and finally beat him, so this is even more important.”

NICKY HAYDEN, MARLBORO DUCATI
Race Position: Seventh                 Championship Position: Fifth

“I GOT RUBBER ON BOTH SIDES OF MY LEATHERS!”
Nicky Hayden made a stunning start to the first race, charging from fifteenth on the grid to ensure sixth spot on the reformed grid. He made up another position in the second race but was unlucky to be passed by two riders after losing the front of his Desmosedici GP10 just three laps from the end, leaving him in an otherwise creditable seventh.

“On paper seventh place doesn’t look like a great result but after qualifying fifteenth yesterday actually it’s not so bad. I was running fifth but with a few laps to go I lost the front coming through the Waterfall and went back to seventh, after which I couldn’t really get back to them. Also, on the last lap, the bike jumped out a gear and I almost crashed so I’m happy to have picked up points. Of course fifth would have been a lot better but I’m proud of my team because yesterday was probably the worst day of our season so far but they worked so hard to change almost everything with the set-up, from the forks to the pivot and the shock. We tested it in the wet morning and it felt okay; I was fifth fastest and comfortable so we rolled the dice and went for it in the race. At the start I was able to recover a lot of positions and got up to sixth when the red flag came out, which did me a favour because it closed the gap back up. I had not the best feeling with the bike for a couple of laps, I was running wide in a lot of places and it was difficult. From there I got into a very aggressive race with Dovi and Simoncelli - I got rubber on both sides of my leathers but you expect that in MotoGP when starting fifteenth. It was a good battle with those guys and overall this is a much more positive result than it looks ahead of my home race at Laguna.”

COLIN EDWARDS, MONSTER YAMAHA TECH 3
Race Position: DNF                         Championship Position: 12th

“I’M MORE MOTIVATED THAN EVER”
A difficult weekend for Colin Edwards ended in disappointing fashion. Despite numerous changes to the set-up of hi s Monster Yamaha YZR-M1 machine throughout the weekend, Edwards was unable to discover a setting that allowed him to push at the fast pace he is capable of. And his hopes of maintaining his proud record of scoring points in every race were ended when he crashed out of 16th position shortly before the race was red flagged.

“I got pushed around a bit at the start and lost time and I was just pushing because what I would lose on acceleration I would try and catch it all up on the brakes. It was my mistake. I ran into the last corner wide and was probably a metre off line and when I tried to pull it back I lost the front. This wasn’t the result I wanted going into my home race next week at Laguna Seca but I’m more motivated than ever to get back on track and recover from a pretty difficult period in the season for me. I love Laguna and the atmosphere created by the fans and rest assured I’ll be aiming to get myself much closer to the front where I know I belong in front of my home crowd.”

The next MotoGP round is at Laguna Seca on Sunday 25th July.

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