NICKY HAYDEN FIFTH IN THE AMERICAN GP
After starting on the front row the Repsol Honda Team rider
is held back by tyre problems
A very complicated race for the American Nicky Hayden at
Laguna Seca. In spite of his third place on the starting grid,
the local hero and his technical team were aware of the fact
that today`s race was not going to be easy. The qualification
tyres had allowed Hayden to make sure of a place on the front
row in the qualifying session but a lack of speed with race
tyres conditioned the World 2006 MotoGP Champion.
Hayden started well and after moving up to third at the third
corner of the circuit – the second left-hander –
stayed in that position until the end of the first lap. Ahead
of him Rossi and Stoner had got away from the rest and were
setting a very fast pace that nobody could keep up with. The
Italian and the Australian were the stars of a tightly fought
battle for the first position, but Stoner fell towards the
end of the race. Hayden led the group fighting for third position;
Vermeulen and Dovizioso were just behind the Repsol rider
and were waiting for their chance.
On the eighth lap Vermeulen got past Hayden cleanly and rapidly
got away from the American as he was faster. On lap 21 the
Italian Dovizioso did the same and even though the Repsol
Honda Team rider was right on his wheel, in fifth position,
he was not able to get past him before the race finished.
In the end Hayden finished the American GP in fifth place,
but had expected to achieve much more in front of his compatriots.
The race was won by the current World Championship leader,
the Italian Valentino Rossi.
Now that the American GP has finished the MotoGP riders have
a deserved summer break almost four weeks long. They return
to action on 15th, 16th and 17th August in the Czech Republic.
The Repsol Honda Team rider Dani Pedrosa, now home recovering,
will return to the competition that weekend.
Quotes
MotoGP
Nicky Hayden >>
“Obviously at my home race I’d hoped to be able
to put up a better fight than that. It was certainly a tough
weekend, we struggled a bit with the tyres we had available.
We really had only two race tyres, the one I used in practice
I kept using again and again, I used it Friday, Saturday and
again this morning, by the end it had 35 laps on it. I think
I learned a good lesson, we set up the bike on quite old tyres.
In the race when we put in a grippy new race tyre the balance
of the bike changed a lot, so it was pushing the front in
a lot of places. I would’ve liked to have been closer
to the front but I think we learned a good lesson. Now we’ve
got a few weeks off, so we’ll regroup and try to finish
the year strong. Hopefully I can improve and they can do some
work in Japan.”
Official Results
MotoGP
1. Valentino ROSSI (YAMAHA) 44:04.311
2. Casey STONER (DUCATI) + 13.001
3. Chris VERMEULEN (SUZUKI) + 26.609
4. Andrea DOVIZIOSO (HONDA) + 34.901
5. Nicky HAYDEN (REPSOL HONDA) + 35.663
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