Another top ten result for KONICA MINOLTA Honda at Misano
The KONICA MINOLTA Honda Team took tenth position at today’s
San Marino and Riviera di Rimini Grand Prix. Team rider Shinya
Nakano got a good start from 14th on the grid, moving up to
9th position on the first lap before slipping back down to
11th a few laps later. Eventually the 29-year-old Japanese
rider was able to establish a consistent rhythm in the middle
of the race, before taking tenth place at the flag. The championship
now moves on to Portugal in two weeks time before the three
‘fly-away’ rounds in Japan, Australia and Malaysia.
Gianluca Montiron – Team Manager KONICA MINOLTA
Honda
“I think in the first part of the race the top three
riders made the difference being able to set a completely
different rhythm to all the other riders. After the crash
in front of Shinya he was able to make up some places, but
then wasn’t able to push as hard as he would like. His
rhythm was not so bad, but still a little off the mid-pack
runners. I think from a positive position we now have more
experience about the chassis and engine parts that arrived
in the Czech Republic and the situation is coming a little
better for us, but we need a more consistent improvement race-by-race.
We were the third Michelin team home today and I think today’s
result shows that so much relates to the tyre situation which
isn’t to our advantage at the moment. I want to say
that we still have trust in our technical partners of HRC
and Michelin and we must now concentrate on the next race.”
Shinya Nakano – Rider, KONICA MINOLTA Honda
(Final position - 10th)
“I didn’t get too bad a start at all. I saw the
accident on the second corner and managed to escape that and
was also able to overtake some other riders so that was OK.
In the middle of the race my lap times were probably better
than any other time over the weekend, which make me feel quite
positive. Just at the end of the 28-lap race I tried to follow
Colin Edwards but couldn’t close the gap to him, then
during the last few laps I lost my rhythm a little and got
overtaken by Alex Hofmann, but he out-braked himself and I
was able to hold my 10th position to the line. The bike felt
OK after we made the modification this morning and had quite
a good feeling from the front, so from this I was able to
make the improvement in lap time and the overall set-up wasn’t
bad at all. I’m OK with a top ten, as despite being
disappointed with how things went after first practice, a
top 10 was what I was aiming for from this weekend.”
Giulio Bernardelle – Technical Director, KONICA
MINOLTA Honda
“This morning we managed to obtain a good compromise
with the overall setting and tried to use a softer choice
for the rear tyre and our performance in the morning was good.
Shinya’s lap time was not so far from what he did with
a qualifying tyre but it was not possible to use this for
the race. Instead, we went back to use another tyre, but we
found that we had a problem with our grip performance which
was simply not enough for the race. We managed to get the
top ten result in part due to the number of riders who were
not able to finish the race, but this is more experience for
us with the updated RC212V and we will head to Portugal hoping
for improved performance overall.”
San Marino GP - MotoGP Sunday race results
1) Casey Stoner Ducati 44’ 34.720”
2) Chris Vermeulen Suzuki 44’ 39.571”
3) John Hopkins Suzuki 44’ 50.722”
4) Marco Melandri Honda 44’ 57.457”
5) Loris Capirossi Ducati 44’ 59.507”
10) Shinya Nakano Honda 45’ 23.528”
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