 Valentino Rossi won his 98th MotoGP in Japan |
Valentino Rossi goes into the Le Mans MotoGP knowing that a win will give him the chance to claim his 100th career grand prix success at his home track in two weeks time. What an incentive for the Italian. You can only begin to imagine how wild the scenes would be in Mugello if he could do it. They are Rossi mad there at the best of times, but it would be incredible if it happened. Who writes his scripts? It's just never-ending. Of course, he has to get Sunday out of the way first and that is not going to be easy, especially after what we saw in Jerez last time out. Dani Pedrosa shocked everyone in finishing second. He has come back from what lots of people thought was a season-wrecking injury, but he has picked up the pace pretty quickly and I was very impressed with him. Personality-wise, he is never going to be a stand-up comedian or anything like that, but he is a very talented rider. Honda seemingly had lost a bit of faith in him, and he had been moaning about the set-up of the bike, so under the circumstances he is doing a good job and can still win the championship.  | LE MANS MOTOGP Saturday 16 May Qualifying: 1200-1500, BBC Red Button/online (repeated on BBC Red Button from 1800. Not Freeview) Sunday 17 May 125cc and 250cc races: 0950-1205, BBC Red Button/online (repeated on BBC Red Button from 1500-1130 Tuesday. Not Freeview) Race live: 1230-1400, BBC Two/online (repeated on BBC Red Button from 1500-1100 Tuesday. Not Freeview) MotoGP Extra: 1400-1430, BBC Red Button/online |
Rossi classes Casey Stoner as his biggest rival, and the young Aussie treated his third-place finish in Jerez as a win as that circuit has always been an Achilles heel for Ducati. I think Stoner is a stronger man than in 2007 when he won the championship due to the fact that he is more mature, has a great deal of knowledge, has learnt to lose, and that all that makes for a championship winning bid. Back to Rossi, though, and he is something special. He inspires everyone around him and that makes the team work so well. Some of the alterations the Yamaha team made for Jerez after they had a bad qualifying time are completely against the grain of what the Japanese bosses want.
But Valentino and his crew chief Jeremy Burgess sat down with the engineers and found a package that he was happy with. It's not all always a package that physically makes the bike better it's often something that makes Valentino feel mentally stronger and he then goes out there and does the job. At the other end of the grid, it's still not happening for James Toseland. Perhaps we read a little bit too much into his performance in Japan. After all he was 45 seconds off the pace in finishing ninth, which was a long way back. I still think it's a confidence issue, he has been apologising to everyone, his team and his fans, but he has just got to get that self belief back. He has to qualify in the front three rows to give himself a chance and get more laps under his belt. At least he can be encouraged by the fact we have gone back to hour-long practice sessions. But it wasn't all bad from a British perspective. In the 125cc class, Bradley Smith finally got the monkey off his back and won his first race. I've never seen him make a better start, he rode superbly and it was a copybook run. What was encouraging is that Bradley can be a bit tardy off the start line, but this time he got his head down from the word go, broke everyone and cleared off. This should hopefully be the first of many more to come.
Le Mans prediction:
1) Valentino Rossi 2) Casey Stoner 3) Chris Vermeulen
Steve Parrish was talking to Paul Birch.
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