Cycle News - Archive Issues - 2000's

Biagg! (3), and his four-stroke Yamaha M1 were finally on-form In France. After continued testing and receiving new parts for the bike, he was able to get onto the front row In qualifying, and then went on to take his first podium position of the year. Here, he chases Rossi and Ukawa (in lead). system, allowing aggressive braking and faster corner-exit speeds. Tricky conditions played a big part. The race started warm and dry, but after nine laps, rain started spotting the track. Lap times dropped by two seconds, and it was clearly slippery. By then, however, Pramac Honda's Tetsuya Harada had also played an unwitting role. A slide sent him running across the gravel at the fast chicane at the end of the back straight. He rejoined, but collided with not only one Gauloises Yamaha rider Shinya Nakano, bending his handlebar, but also the second, Olivier Jacque. More importantly, he had strewn stones across the track, one of which lodged in Jacque's front-wheel bearing, causing him to retire soon afterward. When the leaders came around, Rossi and Ukawa were ahead in close formation - Biaggi and Checa near behind. There were no warning flags, but the first three avoided the gravel. Checa was unsighted, ran straight onto it, and crashed forthwith. Rossi lost the lead soon afterward, and it looked as though he had slowed because of the rain. Not so. "I tried to get away and I made a mistake," Rossi said later. This slowed Ukawa and let Biaggi through to the front. Only for a lap, before Ukawa took over, and they circulated in close company, with the increasingly impressive class rookie Daijiro Kato closing up to join on behind, after moving through from eighth on the first lap. Then, he too crashed, possibly because of the rain, though he later said: "I am not sure if that was the reason the back stepped out." Rain was spattering some parts of the track and not others, and the race was fraught, though lap times dropped again. They all pressed on regardless - a good measure of bravery. Then came Rossi's coup. "I'd tried to go away after 10 laps," Rossi said, "but I was having some tire troubles and made a mistake and that's when Biaggi and Ukawa got past me. After that, I waited in third until I saw Ukawa going away up front, then I passed Biaggi, and afterwards Ukawa." Fourth went to Antena 3 Yamaha's Norick Abe, who had also closed up impressively on the slippery surface and briefly challenged the fourstrokes before settling for safer territory. "They accelerate so fast, you have no chance to pass them," he said later. Telefonica MoviStar Suzuki's Kenny Roberts Jr. was fifth, eight seconds behind, for his best result of the year, two races after switching from Dunlop to Michelin tires. "It's the best we can expect with American teenager John Hopkins (21) had another Impressive weekend in his rookie season. After qualifying 19th - but only 1.66 seconds off of pole position In the closest field ever he went on to finish 11th, ahead of temporary teammate Jean-Michel Bayle (18), Regis Laconi (55), and Jurgen van den Goorbergh (partially hidden). Hopkins has finished In the points in every race this year and now sits 15th In the championship. Records tumbled again at the fourth round of the season, with yet another closest-ever qualifying session: 15 riders within one second of pole, and all 20 starters within 2.215 seconds. Knock out the slowest of them - the returned Jose Cardoso, taking over the Antena 3 Yamaha from the injured Pere Riba - and the gap from Valentino Rossi (pictured) on top to American rookie John Hopkins in 19th was just 1.66 seconds. More significantly, perhaps, this was the first all-four-stroke front row since the advent of the 990cc MotoGP machines for the new racing class this year. Rossi's pole, his fourth in succession for the first time in his glittering career, was achieved only at the finish. but the margin of seven hundredths of a second, after a blistering-close fmal session during which the position had been occupied by Loris Capirossi's two-stroke West Honda and Carlos Checa's four-stroke Marlboro Yamaha Ml, as well as by Rossi. "I put on a soft tire and went for it, but though I did a good lap next time I saw a signal P2 from my pit, so Itried again," explained the Repsol Honda Rider. "Even though I had a lot of wheelspin, I went faster once more. It was a good fight.' The battle, by then, was with Checa, who along with teammate Max Biaggi was much enjoying improvements to the Yamaha MI, mainly an improved electronic slipper-clutch control system that allowed them to brake late into the comers. "Now I feel more comfortable with the bike and I can ride more with my style, being aggressive and braking deep into the apex; said the Spaniard. who had been obliged to fight back several times as his fastest time of yesterday came under repeated attack. One assailant was teammate Biaggi, another beneficiary of the changed fortunes of the red bikes. "How much I wish we had had this clutch system working from the start of the season. We have been trying for months to make it work properly." He was not out of the woods, however, with a breakdown in the morning. "My second bike didn't have the latest system," he said. Ukawa had been close to the top, ending up fourth on the second four-stroke Honda, less than two tenths off pole. He made an interesting contrast to Rossi, riding with his bike set looser, and with even more drama and plenty of wobbles. Capirossi, fastest in the earlier stages of the session, then fitted harder tires to test for race endurance and was knocked down to seventh by the finish by two more two-strokes. Daijiro Kato, the astonishing class rookie and 250cc Champion, was fifth· fastest, picking up speed in his steady and unspectacular style over the two days. Sixth, to the surprise of himself and his team, was Jeremy McWilliams. Nobody had expected that the three.cylinder lightweight Proton KR3 would find any way to overcome its acceleration and speed deficit at this stop-and-go circuit, nor to use its superior corner speed on the predominantly slow U-bends. "I did it by getting a tow down the straight bits and riding the wheels off on the twisty bits," he said. "But I could do good lap times alone." He was wavering between a 16.5-inch and a 17-inch rear after team owner Kenny Roberts had persuaded him to try the latter, in warm conditions that suit the new Bridgestone tires. The last place on the second row went to the increasingly impressive Tetsuya Harada, adapting well to the NSR after a slow start to the season. "We have the suspension right for my style now, and I am enjoying myself,' he said. Kenny Roberts Jr. led row three after cutting almost a second off his previous best lime. He was in good spirits. saying: "At this stage of the bike's development, the front row's not that important to me." In the Suzuki learn's second race this year on Michelins, his improved speed had unearthed some chassis-flexing problems that would take some lime to pin down and fix, he continued. "We need to improve the power - I'm losing too much on acceleration and top speed," he said. Alongside him came Shinya Nakano's Gauloises Yamaha, the only rider not to improve on his lime of yesterday, with Nobuatsu Aoki also slashing his time on the second Proton to slot alongside, still only seven IOths off pole. Abe's Antena 3 Yamaha was next; Olivier Jacque's Gauloises Yamaha led the fourth row from Regis Laconl's Aprilia four-stroke, and an off-form Alex Barros, with a puzzled and disappointed Sete Gibemau 16th on the second Suzuki. Then came Honda's Jurgen van den Goorbergh, Jean-Michel Bayle, impressively up to speed in just one day on the newly vacant McCoy Red Bull Yamaha, narrowly quicker than teammate John Hopkins, busy learning yet another new circuit. "I followed some other riders around yesterday, and today we lifted the rear ride height to put some more weight on the front. I also found a hard Dunlop that suits me better, and I used that for most of the race. I'll be aiming for more points tomorrow,' Hopkins said. Cardoso was last in his first race of the season. In the 250cc class, dry weather meant that all but four wild cards qualified, after only nine had made the cut in the first five dry minutes of yesterday's rainy session. Aprilia's Fonsi Nieto claimed his second successive pole to head an all-Aprilia front row, almost haifa-second ahead of hard·charging French star Randy de Punlet. It might have been different had de Puniet not crashed twice in the closing minutes of the session, pushing just a bit too hard. cue' e n e _ S • MAy 29, 2002 29

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