Cycle News

VOL. 50 ISSUE 28 JULY 16, 2013 Rossi (46) led early then fell back into the clutches of Crutchlow (35). fast sections, and where the highest speed is a relatively sedate 181 mph (Marquez and Pedrosa), he shone throughout the weekend. He qualified fifth, made a blazing start, and was into the first corner in third place, behind Rossi and LCR Honda's Stefan Bradl, but ahead of Marquez and the rest. He was still third at the end of lap two, and while he eventually dropped to eighth, only just unable to regain seventh from Andrea Dovizioso's factory Marlboro Ducati, it was an eyeopening performance. The Aprilia is clearly strong, and a tempting prospect for any private teams considering whether to buy tire wear, but those behind were afflicted even worse. Particularly points leader Scott Redding. He'd qualified eighth, and was up to fifth by lap four, but already in trouble. "From lap two or three I was struggling with rear grip on the left. In the right-handers I was catching hand over fist, but on the left-handers I had virtually no edge grip on entry or exit – then the tire started to tear, which made the grip worse and caused bad chatter." Before half-distance he'd lost fifth to Thomas Luthi, and with 12 laps to go was consigned to seventh by Alex de Angelis. The San Marino rider had one more scalp to fetch, into either Honda's 1.2-million-Euro production version of the RC213V or Yamaha's ultimately more expensive 800,000-Euro engine-only lease package. The Aprilia is thought to be available for 1.2-million, in a package that (like Honda's) is for two bikes and a season's supply of engines. Valentino Rossi's victory at Assen, meanwhile, faded in the memory as he found that "we need to make another step." He'd qualified on the front row of the grid for the first time since October in 2010 (Estoril), but when the chips were down he found himself sliding when not only Marquez had gone away at the front, but Crutchlow had passed him on a B-team Yamaha. "I'm happy with the podi- taking fifth from Luthi by less than half a second on the final lap. Much of the real action came from Anthony West, storming through all race long after finishing the first lap 20th. His last victim, six laps from the end, was pole qualifier Xavier Simeon, and he held him off to the line for eighth, one short of his best result of the year. Espargaro's third gave a little relief to Redding, whose points lead shrank to 23 points, 143-120. It would have been a lot worse had Espargaro managed to retain the lead. Rabat is a distant third on 88, then Aegerter (83) and Kallio (81). P45 Briefly... ner? Dovizioso: "We spoke about that at the Safety Commission – but it is really difficult, there is no space. We can make the corner slower, but we lose part of the runoff area. So it's easy to change the layout, but it is not safe. The best is to have a double compound, if it is possible." Hayden: "I think they could do something to make it a little slower so you had to use some front brake - get a bit of load on the tires." Crutchlow: "I like fast corners, so I don't want to change it that way, but you can see how many big crashes we've had there. The camber goes away, so there is no recovery if you lose the front." Marquez: "For me the corner is so nice. The problem is all the lefts. You are on maybe 50 percent gas. The problem is you are banking but not full banking, so when the front goes you are not able to save it [with your knee]. It is a little bit dangerous, but there is a lot of space on the side, so it is quite safe to crash." Rossi: "To change the layout is more difficult than to make a different front tire, but it may be an option. For sure everything you do will be worse for the taste of the rider, because that corner is fantastic. If you put a chicane, a tight corner it will be worse. But more important is the safety so it may be a solution. That corner is very much off camber – so, keep the same layout, but make the corner with more banking." The track layout was the root cause, but Bridgestone's "mustbe-hot" tires took most of the blame – although to be fair there continued on next page

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