VOL. 55 ISSUE 46 NOVEMBER 20, 2018 P65
could push as hard as I wanted.
Harder than my competitors."
Rossi was losing ground
behind when on lap 10 he had a
second successive race crash,
losing the rear on the slick
track. He remounted, but way
back in 13th place. With Vinales
already gone, however, at least
his third place in the champion-
ship was not under threat.
Later he bemoaned the fact
that he had only used tires
available, compared with Dovi's
new front and rear. But he took
comfort from the fact that he
had been fully competitive in
the last two races. "I'll take that
into the winter," he said.
Rins was comfortable in sec-
ond, finally finishing 2.5 sec-
onds adrift, and ecstatic with
next time around, and keep pull-
ing gradually away.
With new soft tires and a small
change to the bike, he was in
control. "In the first race I was
having some trouble braking,
but we fixed that, and now I
PAINFUL START
Marc Marquez has been suffer-
ing shoulder problems for the past
six races, and when it was partially
dislocated in qualifying on Friday,
it marked second time in the past
week. The five-time MotoGP champi-
on had already explained that the dis-
location that happened when Scott
Redding gave him a vigorous post-
race hug at Motegi after he'd secured
the title had simply been a repeat of a
problem suffered during training with
increasing frequency. At Valencia he
revealed that for the past six races he
has been riding with his left shoulder
heavily strapped; and that he'd had a
partial dislocation earlier in the week
while training "off the bike." Since
Motegi, he has been suffering pain.
"The problem is I didn't stop." He
raced for the next two consecutive
weekends, and now again in Valen-
cia, with two test sessions to follow
before scheduled surgery in Decem-
ber. Muscle strength was enough to
keep him going "unless there is an
impact," he said. His Saturday efforts
were greeted as heroic. He crashed
on his first flying lap in qualifying,
and dislocated the joint as he rolled
through the gravel. Clearly in pain, he
was rushed back to the team truck
to be patched up, and just over six
minutes later he was out on track and
challenging for the front row.
CRASH-FEST
Wet, cold and a tortuous layout led to
a record number of falls at Valencia,
with almost 100 recorded in practice
and qualifying, many riders tumbling
up to four times in practice and
qualifying and then another 57 on
race day. The weekend total was 155,
eclipsing the record 140 set at Misa-
Briefly...
A first podium
for KTM and Pol
Espargaro. The
Spanish veteran
was beyond
ecstatic.
