KONICA MINOLTA Honda and Shinya head home to Japanese Grand
Prix
This weekend sees the 15th round of the MotoGP championship
at the Twin Ring Motegi complex in Japan. The race is a very
important one for the entire Team. Not only because their
rider Shinya Nakano is Japanese, but the Honda RCV212V machinery
and KONICA MINOLTA title sponsor also come from the Land of
the Rising Sun. KONICA MINOLTA Honda’s results at Motegi
have previously been excellent, with Makoto Tamada taking
a third-place finish there in 2005 for the Team. Shinya Nakano’s
own results there have been good too, with the 29-year-old
rider taking a third-place finish at Motegi in 2004 in the
MotoGP class.
The Twin Ring Motegi circuit was built by Honda in the 1990s
and opened its doors to the public in 1997. Set in the Hakko
mountain chain, the 2.98mile circuit is surrounded by forest,
with the Nakagawa river flowing by. The name itself indicates
two racing courses: the Super Speedway – an American-style
oval course – and a European-style road course. The
track has hosted a Grand Prix round since 1999, although initially
the race was called the ‘Pacific GP’ while the
Japanese round was still at the Suzuka race circuit. Since
2004, only the Twin Ring Motegi circuit has been used to host
a GP in Japan.
Gianluca Montiron – Team Manager KONICA MINOLTA
Honda
“For us the Japanese Grand Prix at Twin Ring Motegi
is like a third home race, after Mugello and Misano! This
obviously gives us plenty of motivation, especially after
Estoril where we noted some improvements with the machine
and tyre combination. I think a home race will give Shinya
a better position to do well. I think he needs confidence
to ride and enjoy the track, and from this comes a good lap
time, I think in the past he’s not been able to do that,
but things have been improving steadily since Brno and I also
feel something has changed in Shinya so I think that he’s
coming to Motegi with more confidence than before. We have
both trust and belief in Shinya at ‘our’ home
race of Motegi and so a top eight finish is our target.”
Shinya Nakano – Rider, KONICA MINOLTA Honda
“As you can imagine I’m very much looking forward
to my home race in front of the fans, the Honda factory and
KONICA MINOLTA! Being a Honda track it’s very important
to do well here! I like Motegi very much, but it is a stop-and-go
circuit with some hard braking and accelerating areas. The
overall grip on the circuit isn’t too bad, although
in the past I’ve found the circuit pretty tough on tyres,
so we will see what will happen with my 2007 package of the
Honda RC212V and Michelin tyres. With the steady improvements
that we’ve made over the last few races, I think that
we will have a pretty good package for this, my home race!”
Giulio Bernardelle – Technical Director, KONICA
MINOLTA Honda
“Motegi is a very important race for us! I’m thinking
that after Misano and Estoril we have seen our situation improve,
partly from machine improvements but particularly concerning
the Michelin tyres we can now use. We found in Misano and
during practice at Estoril that getting improved performance
from the rear tyre was a most important step forward for our
overall results and I think that Michelin’s improvement
for us has come just at the right time as we head to Motegi.
When you consider the layout of the track it’s not perfect
for us, as it is a circuit where you have lots of acceleration
areas and perhaps our engine is not as strong as we would
like. Let’s hope that we can help Shinya find a good
setting over the weekend and possibly find a few extra tenths
of a second just by racing at home!”
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