MOTOGP WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP
VOL. 51 ISSUE 17 APRIL 29, 2014 P57
the leading pair.
What followed was a ride to
redeem his own reputation, also
suffering under the brand of Mar-
quez. Pedrosa rode better than
many could remember, and set
fastest lap as he chiseled away at
the gap, a few tenths at the time.
With two laps to go he was on
his quarry, and scythed past de-
cisively. Lorenzo let him go. He
had no fight left.
"It didn't count for much," Pe-
drosa said glumly afterwards. "I
lost too much time early on. To-
day I had the pace to fight for the
win."
Honda's superiority at this
stage of the season is demoral-
izing for Yamaha; while Ducati
failed to follow up on the COTA
rostrum, as familiar problems of
tire wear slowed Andrea Dovizio-
so later in the race. After two
engine blow-ups and with the
absence of injured second rider
Cal Crutchlow, it was a sobering
weekend for the Italians.
The race followed worries
about severe tire wear on the
sand-grainy track surface, with
all riders choosing the hard rear.
Marquez, Valentino Rossi, Brad-
ley Smith and a couple of others
also chose the hardest of three
available fronts – an extra allo-
cation over the usual two after
problems of rapid front wear at
Austin.
The upside for both riders and
fans was lots of sliding on the
long corners, with nobody quite
as carefree with the back wheel
as dominant Marquez.
Briefly...
straying from the black strip trailing
dust and dealing with a major loss
of grip. Front-row Moto2 qualifier
Xavier Simeon said: "If you go off
line, you are dirt-tracking." The rate
of wear was still a concern, how-
ever; and tire choice a vexed ques-
tion. With the rate they were getting
chewed up in practice some teams
requested an extra allocation. This
was firmly vetoed by Honda, whose
team riders had been careful not to
use too many.
Rossi and Marquez paid the price
of superstardom when they were
mobbed outside a Termas de Rio
Hondo restaurant on Wednesday
night, even before the weekend's
fan invasion, with ticketless hope-
fuls streaming in from all corners of
South America. The riders and their
retinues had to fight their way clear
of a crowd that was friendly enough,
but close to hysteria. "We can a little
bit understand the feelings of animals
in the zoo," said Rossi the next day.
"I expected something like this, with
a lot of people already at the airport. I
think it will be a difficult weekend, but
it's better to have a lot of fans than
nobody." Marquez raised a laugh by
saying that his problem was Rossi's
fault. The fans had spotted Valen-
tino's party at the back of the restau-
rant and were crowding round, "And
then somebody said: 'Oh, in front is
Marquez."
Ducati had double reason to be glad
of its special "Factory/non-Factory"
status after two embarrassingly pub-
lic engine blow-ups ate into their
engine allocation. The first struck
Andrea Dovizioso in FP2, with a
plume of white smoke as he backed
off for turn seven. He was able to de-
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