Cycle News

ROAD RACE FIM MOTOGP WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP ROUND 16 / OCTOBER 23, 2016 PHILLIP ISLAND CIRCUIT / PHILLIP ISLAND, AUSTRALIA P68 last year the factory Ducati rider fin- ished on the podium. The Austrian GP winner had pulled out of the Japanese GP just a week before the race, still recovering from back inju- ries suffered in practice at Misano. He'd been declared fit, but his own doctor advised further rest, he told the team. In spite of unofficial word that he was now expected back for Sepang, the paddock was awash with talk that Iannone may miss the rest of the season, returning only to test his next year's Suzuki after the final round in Valencia. Iannone has made no secret of his disgruntlement with Ducati, after they made the ear- ly decision to retain the services of Andrea Dovizioso instead of him for next year, to ride alongside new re- cruit Jorge Lorenzo. His unexpected absence was a bonus for Australian fans. With Hector Barbera again drafted in to the factory squad, 2015 Australia Superbike Champion Mike Jones got a second chance on the vacant satellite Avintia Ducati. Jones impressed again, and scored a point for a solid 15th-place finish, ahead of GP regular and former Moto2 Cham- pion Tito Rabat. Anyone doubting the force exerted by fairing-flank winglets were given pause on the first day of practice, when wind pressure ripped one off the side of Danilo Petrucci's Pramac Ducati as he built up speed on Phil- lip Island's downhill straight. The winglets are attached only by pop- rivets, to avoid the likelihood of one inflicting injury during a crash, and the team was advised to fit bigger washers to avoid the shedding of any more bodywork in normal use. Wings are to be banned from the end of this season. Volatile weather added to a nightmare start to the weekend at his favorite circuit for Valentino Rossi, after he'd already fallen foul of officialdom in the first practice session. The Movistar Yamaha rider had placed second in FP1, but when it was discovered that he had run more than the decreed 10-lap maximum on Michelin's spe- cial super-soft front rain tire, his lap times from that run were cancelled, and he was dropped to second-last. The tire had been brought in prepa- ration for the Australian circuit's fre- quently plunging temperatures, but although Michelin said the tire would last longer than that, Technical Direc- tion imposed a 10-lap limit, to be on the safe side. It was only the start for the multi-champion's worst two days of practice and qualifying in five years, since his downbeat two years with Ducati. He was just one of sev- eral top riders caught out by condi- tions in FP3, and condemned to join Lorenzo, Crutchlow and Vinales with the usual satellite-team suspects in Q1. That session also saw constantly changeable conditions, but Rossi left his switch to the right tires too late, and while Crutchlow and Lo- renzo placed first and second to go through, he ended up fifth, putting him 15th on the grid. It was his first time in Q1 since Aragon last year, not to run in Q2, and his worst qualify- ing position since he was 16th on the grid in Germany in 2011 on the Duca- ti. "I never felt the right feeling wet or dry," he said. "It looks when it is very cold we struggle to get the tires up to temperature and the bike becomes very difficult to ride." Lorenzo found the same, in the drier Q2, placing 12th and last. Marc Marquez took his seventh pole of the season with a trace-mark tire gamble, after dominating the weather-hit free practice sessions. It was his 65th of his career, putting him one ahead of Rossi and Lorenzo, and winning him the 2016 BMW qual- ifying award. The track was damp but drying quickly at the start of Q2, with a heavy shower forecast to ar- rive midway, and riders hurried out on various combinations of wet and intermediate tires. Marquez (along with Jack Miller and Petrucci) rode straight back into the pits, but only he risked slicks front and rear, with the other two staying with an intermediate front. The rain didn't come, and Mar- quez ran a series of increasingly fast laps to get pole by an eventual eight tenths. "This weekend has been re- ally, really tricky, and you needed to have a clever strategy," he said. My setup was not perfect—I'm lucky that the championship was already done in Japan." Crutchlow, through from Q1, was second, complaining that his instinct had been to go on slicks throughout, but that he'd changed his mind to an intermediate front. "I should have trusted my instinct," the LCR Honda rider said. Pol Espargaro was third, first front row of the season for the Monster Yamaha rider. Broth- er Aleix (Ecstar Suzuki) led row two from Miller (EG-VDS Honda) and Pe- trucci (Pramac Ducati). One-off Rep- sol Honda rider Nicky Hayden led row three; Lorenzo made it through from Q1, but languished 12th and last in the senior session. Briefly...

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