Cycle News - Archive Issues - 2000's

World Championship Road Race Series Round 1 1 : Portuguese Grand Prix but could get no higher than ninth, comfortably ahead of Harada, the still off-form McCoy and last-placed Nakano, who slipped off and remounted. Van den Goorbergh was the first retirement, with a failure in his slickshift system causing an ignition misfire and a return to the pits after just two laps. Aoki seized and quit on the same lap after taking in water on the line and battling an intermittent misfire. Laconi fell with 25 laps left, Capirossi after just three more, and Kato one lap later, from a lowly position. "It was my first time on the fourstroke in the rain," Kato said. "Great expectations come to nothing." IAbovel Checa 171 leaves his teammate Max Blaggl 131 In his wake as he heads for the front after a bad start. !Right) John Hopkins 121) battled the conditions to finish eighth after an offtrack excursion. Here he leads Loris Capirossl 1651. who ended up crashing out of the race. falling off close together but independently on one of the tight chicanes; and by the end of the lap Rossi led from Barros and Roberts, with pole starter Checa way down in 12th. Gibemau was fifth across the line, but on a mission, diving past McWilliams into the first comer, and up to third by the end of lap two as Barros dropped back to sixth behind McWilliams and Ukawa. One more lap and Gibemau was leading, and immediately pulling away. By then, Aoki had retired with his engine seized after taking in water, and McWilliams had fallen off after similar problems. "It was a difficult situation," McWilliams said. "My engine was missing when I was in their draft, but I had to stay there to keep my position." He remounted at the back. There was no stopping Gibernau. Although, he later said, he was having worsening clutch problems throughout, he was surfing the puddles and pulling away steadily from Rossi - a full second on lap four, up to 1.6 on lap six. Teammate Roberts had opted for a more cautious approach, and Ukawa was ahead of him on lap six, then past Rossi one lap later, giving Gibernau even more breathing space, so by the time Rossi found his way past again on lap 12, he had almost six seconds in hand. Now the race was on. "I found my rhythm when I was following Ukawa, and I could pull away from him. But Sete had another idea," he said later. For lap after lap, one or the other would set an even faster lap, and 10 SEPTEMBER 18, 2002' though Rossi was gradually closing up, it was not fast enough, and Gibernau was responding to every challenge. At the end of lap 24, Gibemau had 3.6 seconds in hand and four laps to go. "I was controlling Rossi, and confident he couldn't catch me before the finish. I'd been having some problems with the new clutch all race long, getting worse - maybe because of the rain. I was upright, and I closed the throttle, and the back wheel just locked," the bitterly disappointed rider said later. He landed heavily after the highside crash, and left the track in an ambulance. It was plain sailing for Rossi, who has now inherited three such wins in the last four races. In Britain, he was second to Checa when the Yamaha rider fell off (admittedly with a fair way to go and the issue still in doubt); at the Sachsenring he was clearly beaten by Jacque and Barros when they collided in front of him. But you make your own luck in racing, they say, and Rossi never gave up in Portugal, and kept piling the pressure on to Gibernau from a distance. All credit to him. n e _ s cue • • Checa had been providing the excitement behind this, pulling through at an increasing pace after his slow start. By lap three, he was seventh, pulling the soon-to-crash Laconi along with him, and behind Biaggi and Barros. He passed both on the next lap, and immediately started to pull clear to close a gap of almost three seconds on the leaders. He was on Roberts by lap 11, and past him for fourth a lap later, now closing down on Ukawa. In four laps, he was in front of him too, and fended him off to the finish, pulling clear by the time Gibernau had promoted him to second. Biaggi had his hands very full with Barros. He had switched to the more familiar older chassis, and managed to stay narrowly ahead of the twostroke until the final lap. There was plenty of drama behind as the remainder battled the conditions, but not much in the way of close racing. Hopkins had been ahead of Abe until a grisly aquaplaning moment took him onto the gravel. He managed not to crash, but lost an eventual seventh to Abe. McWilliams was pushing through from the back, So Rossi piled on the points, 1'10w up to 245, with Ukawa on 156. His second place is under some threat from Biaggi (144), with Checa (116) closing slowly and Barros on 105. 250cc GRAND PRIX Pouring down, and Randy de Puniet pulled out on the start line as Rolfo led the cloud of spray down the hill. Nieto was in front by the end of the lap, but Matsudo was flying and steamed past into the first corner. He was lapping two seconds a lap faster than anyone else at this stage, and by lap six had almost eight seconds in hand. By then, Rolfo had been called in for a stop-and-go penalty (he later bitterly protested the injustice that had robbed him of a potential win, because he hadn't been over the white line, but officials explained he had started too far back, and was already rolling when the lights went green). This left Franco Battaini's Aprilia in second, with Haru Aoki and Nieto in close company, and a growing gap to Melandri, going carefully, and having to use all of his extra power to

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