Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/128222
Wortd Champlonl!lhip Road Race Series By MICHAEL SCOTT PHOTOS By GOLD AND GOOSE ASSEN, HOLLAND, JaNE 28 ne always waits for the rain to fall at Assen. It has a knack of doing so at the worst possible moment for the main race. It happened again this year, after two days of deceptively benign and sunny practice - aborting the first start, delaying the race by almost half an hour, confounding predictions and casting the weak to one side. And giving a third win of the year to ralnmaster Telefonica MoviStar Honda's Sete Gibernau. The Spaniard, who took over the late Daijiro Kato's factory Honda after his first win in South Africa, fought off a persistent Max Biaggi on his Camel Honda until the pair were separated as they lapped back marker Garry McCoy's Kawasaki. Gibernau made the most of the opportunity to escape, on a drying track that suited his choice of hardcompound wet tires, with Biaggi on a O 18 JULY 9,2003' cue I e softer choice. At the finish, he had stretched his advantage to 10 seconds, taking fastest lap into the bargain. The tire choice was significant ... he gained Michelin's 300th GP win. Championship leader Repsol Honda's Valentino Rossi was third, only three seconds behind Biaggi at the finish in conditions where he was reluctant to take too many risks. He had already seen Troy Bayliss come flying past convincingly on his Ducati, only for the Australian to fall off a little way ahead (caught out while trying to fix a recalcitrant quick-shift mechanism). There were several other victims of the slick surface. Alice Aprilia rider Nori Haga fell after a storming ride to a strong fourth place, slipping off while trying to wipe his visor clean for vision in the foul conditions. Yukio Kagayama, riding substitute for the injured Kenny Roberts on the Suzuki, crashed out of the points while disputing an eventual 12th with Camel Honda's Tohru Ukawa. And both Pron e _ s ton KR riders brought a troubled weekend to a close by crashing out of the race. Gibernau was delighted with a win that reinforced his second place in the championship. "Everything worked great today ... the bike and the tires,« he said. "The biggest problem was seeing anything - so it was a bit advantage to be in front." Biaggi was also happy to have come out well from the inevitable tire lottery. . "A wet race is always complicated, unpredictable and very difficult," Biaggi said. "I was not finding it too difficult to stay with Sete, but I lost contact when we lapped McCoy. I tried everything to get back, but it was impossible. Rossi, like many others, spoke of the vision difficulties in the spray. "At the beginning I could see nothing because of mist in my visor. In the end I found a rhythm, and we made the podium and didn't lose too many points.« Fortuna Yamaha's Carlos Checa was fourth and top Yamaha, heading Gauloises Yamaha Olivier Jacque and Loris Capirossi, who had overcome earlier wheelspin problems with the Marlboro Ducati. Colin Edwards suffered from poor vision and a soft tire choice, going well in the earlier stages only to lose touch to finish seventh on the Alice Aprilia. "I wouldn't expect my worst enemy to race in conditions like that: Edwards said. "My bike was way better than my vision - I was riding from memory: Gauloises Yamaha's Alex Barros was eighth; Bayliss had a storming ride back through the field after remounting to ninth, ahead of Kawasaki's Alex Hofmann and Repsol Honda's Nicky Hayden. American Suzuki rider John Hopkins scraped into the points in 15th, a Jap down after battling the machine's erratic off-throttle behavior under the infJu-