Double top-10 for Rizla Suzuki MotoGP in tough Estoril weekend
 Rizla
Suzuki MotoGP racers Chris Vermeulen and Loris Capirossi raced
to eighth and ninth places respectively during today’s
Portuguese Grand Prix at Estoril, to earn valuable points
in the race for the championship.
Vermeulen got off to a great start from his 13th position
on the grid and was up to eighth by the end of lap one. Suzuki’s
Australian star then traded places with a number of riders
before bringing his Suzuki GSV-R home for his highest placed
finish of the year so far.
Capirossi made a good start and picked up a couple of places
in the first lap. The experienced Italian struggled to get
the grip he was looking for throughout the race, but still
battled on to bring the bike home in a respectable ninth position,
a result that moves him up to sixth in the rider’s championship.
Nearly 42,000 fans at trackside watched as the dry race began
with a light rain shower, causing the white flags to be displayed,
allowing the riders to come in and change their bikes for
ones with wet weather tyres – an option which no rider
took. As the rain eased off, Spaniard Jorge Lorenzo on a factory
Yamaha raced away to his premier MotoGP victory and first
position in the championship.
Rizla Suzuki MotoGP will now stay in Estoril for a one day
test before travelling to Shanghai in China for round four
of the 2008 MotoGP World Championship on Sunday 4th May.
Chris Vermeulen:
“I made a good start from the fifth row and picked
up some places in the first couple of corners. It was spitting
with rain a bit at the start so it made it difficult to judge
how hard to push. I got into a good position and had a battle
with Stoner, Toseland and de Puniet for quite a long while
in the race. Towards the end we started to get a bit of front
end vibration and that caused me to slow down a bit, but it
is the closest we have been to the front this year and we
must keep making progress!”
Loris Capirossi:
“I didn’t expect such a difficult race today
because we did such a good job in practice yesterday and I
thought we would do much better! I was fighting a lot from
the beginning for grip and I don’t know why the tyres
didn’t work well, maybe it was a change in the temperature
or the humidity – I just don’t know. I tried to
keep a good rhythm but it was really tough out there and when
the race is as difficult as that I just try to keep going
and get as good a result as possible, which is what I did
today. I am obviously disappointed – not just for me
but for the whole team – because our target is much
bigger than what we achieved today.”
Paul Denning – Team Manager:
“It has been a disappointing Grand Prix and we’d
hoped for a lot better. We got both bikes into the top 10
but realistically we needed a bit of luck to do that, it’s
very clear that we still have a lot of work to do. On the
same bike and the same tyres yesterday, Loris could easily
make very competitive lap-times, but today we really struggled
to stay in touch. Our grip potential seemed to change a lot
today, whereas our competitors didn’t seem to be as
badly affected.
“We are here for a full day’s testing tomorrow
and let’s hope we can find a bit more pace, put this
race behind us and head to Shanghai where we know the Bridgestone
tyres and the Suzuki GSV-R have worked well in the past!”
bwin.com Grande Premio de Portugal Race Classification:
1. Jorge Lorenzo (Yamaha) 45’53.089: 2. Dani Pedrosa
(Honda) +1.817: 3. Valentino Rossi (Yamaha) +12.723: 4. Colin
Edwards (Yamaha) +17.223: 5. John Hopkins (Kawasaki) +23.752:
8. CHRIS VERMEULEN (RIZLA SUZUKI MOTOGP) +36.382: 9. LORIS
CAPIROSSI (RIZLA SUZUKI MOTOGP) +38.268:
World Championship Classification:
1. Lorenzo 61: 2. Pedrosa 61: 3. Rossi 47: 4. Casey Stoner
(Ducati) 40: 5. James Toseland (Yamaha) 29. 6. LORIS CAPIROSSI
(RIZLA SUZUKI MOTOGP) 26: 12. CHRIS VERMEULEN (RIZLA SUZUKI
MOTOGP) 14:
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