Dani Pedrosa wins again at San Marino MotoGP race

Jorge Lorenzo looked to be on target to take the 2010 FIM MotoGP World Championship title, but the twelfth round of the series was at the Misano circuit, close to the home town of his Fiat Yamaha team-mate Valentino Rossi, the reigning champion. Rossi had won at Misano in the last two years, and was targeting winning form again after injury in June this year.

Valentino reflected this ambition with an alarm clock image on his crash helmet, and no doubt his many neighbourhood fans also hoped to see him on top again. There were, of course, other Italian riders in the field, but none of those four had won at Misano previously. The track had been off the GP calendar between 1993 and 2007, at which point it was a modified version with the direction of travel reversed that faced the competitors. Winners at the ‘new’ Misano have included Casey Stoner, Jorge Lorenzo, Álvaro Bautistá and Héctor Barberá, plus Ben Spies as a Superbike racer.

Qualifying saw four of the five Italian riders grouped together on the third and fourth rows of the grid, but with Rossi separate from them and closer to the front. In fact, the Yamaha rider was fourth, a couple of places behind team-mate Lorenzo, and this would be his best grid start since coming back from his injuries. The same was true for LCR Honda rider Randy de Puniet, who was in sixth place here. Either side of Lorenzo, the other front row men were Stoner, third for Marlboro Ducati; and Dani Pedrosa, on pole position for the fourth time this year.

The Monster Tech 3 Yamaha pair were on either side of de Puniet, with Spies fifth and Colin Edwards seventh. It was the seventh time that the 25-year-old newcomer had started ahead of his experienced fellow Texan. In eighth to eleventh places came the other Italian riders, led by Repsol’s Andrea Dovizioso, from Marco Simoncelli and Marco Melandri (both San Carlo Gresini Honda) and Loris Capirossi (Rizla Suzuki). The 37-year-old would be making his 200th premier class GP start, having raced 500cc machinery in 1995-96 and since 2000 through all the capacity changes.

In twelfth place was Barberá (Páginas Amarillas Aspar Ducati), from Hiroshi Aoyama (Interwetten Honda), Nicky Hayden (Marlboro Ducati), Aleix Espargaró (Pramac Ducati), Bautistá (Rizla Suzuki) and finally seventeenth man Mika Kallio (Pramac Ducati). Spaniards Barberá and Espargaró had got into some racing against each other during the timed session, whereas Stoner had crashed because of a problem with his bike’s forks.

Before the MotoGP race had been the Moto2 contest, which was sadly marred by an incident involving three riders. Apparently Alex de Angelis and Englishman Scott Redding were largely unscathed, but young Japanese rider Shoya Tomizawa was seriously hurt. His GP career had started out with wildcard rides for Honda, beginning on a 125 in 2006. His full season of 250 racing in 2009 had yielded a couple of tenth place results, and surely there was more to come. Tragically, during the course of the MotoGP race it was announced that Tomizawa had died. It was the first GP fatality since 2003.

For the race start, with conditions a bit blustery, there was the familiar sight of Pedrosa getting away in the lead. The current version of the Misano track sees firstly a right-hander at Curva Rimini and then an immediate left at Variante del Parco. First time into Rimini, Stoner moved onto the inside of Lorenzo to take second position, with Rossi fourth from Edwards, Dovizioso and Simoncelli. Out of del Parco, there was a clash between Capirossi and Hayden. Loris was on the outside when Nicky fell, and both men went down.

A few corners round the track there is the long right-handed Curva del Tramonto loop, leading onto the back straight. This bend saw Lorenzo retake second from Stoner, moving through on the inside. Sixth man Dovizioso was quick to move up one at the expense of Edwards, then close on the leading group, and soon enough Simoncelli also got the better of Colin. Behind these guys, eighth man de Puniet headed Melandri, Spies, Barberá, Espargaró, Aoyama, Bautistá and Kallio. Hayden had got back to the pits after a couple of laps, but with a broken gear-shifter was not going to go on.

Leader Pedrosa was on lap record form as he pulled away from Lorenzo. Stoner, Rossi and Dovizioso were all in close contact with the second man, as Simoncelli raced on in a lonely sixth place. Dani was ahead by 1.6s after three laps, and this was up to three seconds after seven laps. Lorenzo began to ease away from Stoner, with Rossi closing on the Australian. Dovizioso remained in touch. Valentino was soon in place to challenge Casey.

There is a bit of a run-in to the acute left-handed seventh corner, Curva della Quercia, giving an out-braking opportunity. Rossi passed Stoner here on the inside, but ran a bit wide so that the Ducati man went back through on the inside for the corner exit. Following Tramonto is the long run through several fast right-handers, each getting more tight than the last. The fourth and last of these is the acute turn at Curva del Carro, and this saw Valentino overtake on the inside. He went a bit wide again, with Casey fighting back again, but this time the Italian was set for the following left-hander and was through into third place.

Half way into the race, Pedrosa led Lorenzo by almost five seconds and looked comfortable. Jorge was also clear of Rossi, and Stoner had already lost out to Dovizioso - he had completed his move coming out of Carro, getting through on the outside for the next turn. Casey now began to drop off from the two Italians. With Rossi moving clear of Dovizioso, the top five positions were pretty much set to the finish. Pedrosa was able to back off in the last few laps and still win, while Valentino eased closer to his team-mate but remained third.

The contest behind these five had involved quite a bit of action. For some reason, Simoncelli had quickly dropped from sixth to 15th, presumably with an off-track incident. Meanwhile, Spies had already passed Melandri (at Quercia) and de Puniet, before passing team-mate Edwards, also at Quercia. Ben moved clear to salvage a good sixth from tenth place early on. Colin was seventh, but the big contest had been for eighth.

There had been quite a bit of place changing between Melandri, de Puniet and Barberá, with Espargaró and Bautistá at the rear of the group. The Suzuki man would work his way through to lead this battle, then move clear for eighth at the flag. Barberá’s pass on de Puniet, inside through the fast right Curvone Veloce, pushed the French rider out wide and briefly off the track. This saw Randy now at the back of the group. A tussle between Barberá and Melandri then developed for ninth, which the Spaniard eventually won. Marco headed home Espargaró, Aoyama, de Puniet and Simoncelli, with Kallio having stopped in the pits.

Dani Pedrosa’s win was his fourth of the season, the most he’s managed since his last year of 250cc racing, and it also marked his first pair of back-to-back MotoGP class wins. It was also the 90th win in the class since the works HRC outfit had forged their title sponsorship arrangement with Repsol, which was in 1995. With Jorge Lorenzo second, the gap in the points was now down to 63 - still a lot, but it gave Pedrosa an outside chance if he could keep on winning. And meanwhile, Valentino Rossi took his second podium result from his fifth race back after injury, getting ever closer to third overall in the standings.

Moves for 2011: It was now known that both Colin Edwards and Álvaro Bautistá would stay with their respective teams for the new season, with Loris Capirossi on the move to Pramac Racing, where Mika Kallio would surely be the man replaced. Meanwhile, it looked like Marco Melandri might be following former MotoGP winners such as Max Biaggi, Alex Barros, Carlos Checa, Makoto Tamada and Chris Vermeulen with a move to Superbike racing. He was expected to join either Yamaha or BMW in the production-based series.

Standings after twelve races: Lorenzo 271; Pedrosa 208; Dovizioso 139; Stoner and Rossi 130; Spies 120; Hayden 109; de Puniet 81; Melandri 67; Edwards 66; Simoncelli 65; Barberá 61.
Yamaha 280; Honda 245; Ducati 170; Suzuki 64.