Pedrosa happy to take another hard-earned podium after comeback

Laguna Seca does not usually disappoint the thousandths of fans that year after year go to the hills of the outskirts of Monterey to enjoy the purest MotoGP essence. And, once again, the American round did not fail and the race saw another duel between the three riders in the best form of the premiere category, Casey Stoner, Dani Pedrosa and Jorge Lorenzo.

Lorenzo had a very fast start when the lights went out and rode constantly at 1 minute and 21 seconds, a very quick pace. Only Pedrosa seemed to be able to follow his countryman’s pace, with Stoner in third and Dovizioso fourth at the beginning of the race. Stoner rode a bit far from the two Spaniards, but he did not give in and, although he could not catch the duo, he did not lose terrain.

After the first half of the race, Lorenzo and Pedrosa kept the lead less than one second ahead of Stoner, and Dovizioso was fourth and rode alone. Stoner then started to reduce differences and caught up with Lorenzo and Pedrosa 17 laps before the end of the race, that had 32 laps. The Australian did not want wait to try and overtake Pedrosa, and he did so two laps later in an impressive manoeuvre entering the mythical corkscrew. Lorenzo, who had some tenths over Pedrosa, was within his reach.

Stoner caught up with Lorenzo four laps later, when there were 11 laps left before the end, while Pedrosa, still with some physical problems after his injuries, suffered more the fatige in the demanding American track than last week in Germany and he had already lost one second and a half. Dani secured his third position and was satisfied in the end to get a new podium in a circuit where last year he was not able to finish due to a crash.

After this result, Stoner reinforces his position in front of the overall standings with an advantage of 20 points over Lorenzo. Dovizioso keeps his third place, but now 50 points behind his team mate, and Pedrosa goes up to the fourth position, 83 behind Stoner. After the race, the World Championship takes a 2-week break and will resume the action next August 14 in Brno, Czech Republic.

Dani Pedrosa 3rd at 9.467 sec.
“I’m very happy with another podium, the second after my come back from injury. I could have predicted this result before coming to Laguna because I knew it would be physically very tough for me and it has been great to keep up with the pace of Casey [Stoner] and Jorge in these past two races.

Today, by the middle of the race, I was very tired, almost finished, I couldn’t get my left arm strong enough and here at this track you don’t rest for a moment, so I had to drop. It’s been quite difficult to set up the bike this weekend, I had a lack of grip generally, but the team worked very well.

Now we have some holidays and it will be good for me to have some days off to rest and relax my muscles and be back training to arrive fully fit to Brno”.

Source: Repsol Media