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/956070
MOTOGP FIM MOTOGP WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP ROUND 1 / MARCH 18, 2018 LOSAIL INTERNATIONAL CIRCUIT / DOHA, QATAR P96 iii My Own Race: 25 MAVERICK VINALES 6TH MOTOGP "In today's race I felt really good with the bike, better than I did before," Maverick Vinales said. "We followed the direction of how I wanted the bike and we improved so much, especially our rhythm. Now that we have done that, we know we have a good bike and we can focus on improving other things. Honestly, during the tests I didn't try many starts, I was focused on the bike, so today's start was bad. However, now we've recovered the feeling with the bike—especially for the race— we can work on other areas. We found a good setup, but we can still improve and match the electronics more to my riding style, and we can also work on the starts. When you finish a race like today's, you wish that the next GP would be held the next weekend. We're quite motivated. I felt that, if I had been more toward the front today, I could have had a chance to win the race. I'm happy the team did such a great job, especially on Saturday in the afternoon. We found something good for our riding style and that's perfect." 26 DANI PEDROSA 7TH MOTOGP "In general, the bike worked well enough and I'm happy because we were able to improve our feeling over the weekend," Dani Pedrosa said. "The hard front tire was actually a very good choice as I could brake hard into the corners and keep a decent pace. We focused a lot on the feeling from the front over the weekend and finally decided to go with what we'd worked toward. I had a good start and I'm happy with how I managed the first corners. Unfortunately, the feeling from the rear tire wasn't as strong. The tire was spinning a lot, which caused me to loose ground in turn three and some other corners in sector four. It's a real shame because the first race is important and I think that if didn't have this issue I could've fought for the podium. In the end, that gives me confidence for the upcoming races." 99 JORGE LORENZO DNF MOTOGP "It wasn't one of the best weekends for me," Jorge Lorenzo said. "I had a lot of problems and my crash was the result of a problem with the front brakes. Already on lap two, I realized that something wasn't right and I tried to manage the situation, but the problem was getting worse. I thought it was an overheating problem, but when I was about to catch Andrea Iannone, I wasn't able to stop the bike and I tipped myself off to avoid worse damage. Now we have to understand what exactly happened to prevent the same problem from repeating itself in the future. It's a pity because I was lapping with good times and I think I could have got closer to the leading group." 15 JOEL ROBERTS 25TH MOTO2 "Obviously, this outcome doesn't match where we want to be, but it was the first race and we were able to finish it," said American Joel Roberts (NTS RW Racing GP). "About the race itself, it is to say that my start was really good, and I could catch up quite a lot of positions. I think I went into turn one in 23rd position. The feeling with the bike was really good. But as you know, our bike is still new and sometimes if you try to go around to find out which will be a good direction, it ends up, thus, that it will not be the right way. Of course, it's a bit unfortunate that we figured out this during the race because I think we had a lot of potential to be quite far up this weekend. Anyway, we move on and go to the next race, which again is a new track and a new challenge for us, too. But I'm still very confident for this year that we can be very competitive."