13 April 2012

MotoGP : Qatar (Race 1)

So it was the first race of the season this weekend (I know it is now Thursday I've been pretty busy!) and in a happy turn of events, with it being Easter Sunday, I managed to watch all the classes fully live!

Of course that will probably be the only time I get to do that this year other than my birthday weekend (French GP wooo!) but it was a nice way to spend a Sunday evening!




Moto3 : I'm going into Moto3 totally neutral as I don't really support anyone in that class. I was really impressed with Fenati and it had NOTHING to do with him being Italian. Honestly! I don't really think talent in the lower classes will mean talent in the main pack (same with GP2 and F1) but there was a lot of talent in the race especially at the front of the grid with Fenati and eventual race winner Viñales.

The pack stayed pretty nicely together throughout most of the race and from about 3rd - 7th (maybe even 8th) it felt like if you blinked you'd miss something.

Another stand out performance for me was Sissis and not only because he has the most awesome name I've ever seen in Motor sports!

The new bikes sound so much like lawn mowers its unbelievable and it gave me a bit of a headache listening to them on my headphones.

From a neutral point of view it was an interesting race and Moto3 looks like it will be a lot of fun this year. Unfortunately for me I doubt I'll see many of the races as I work on Sundays and its all on the red button. Hopefully I'll be able to watch it more often and look forward very much to seeing them live at Silverstone!


Moto2 : It was nice getting to see Moto2 kick off! I have a lot of favorites on the Moto2 grid and happy to see the numbers have been calmed down a bit now!

The race was won by Marc Marquez, but he didn't dominate like most people thought he would and, in my opinion, might not have won if it wasn't for a dirty shove off the road to Tom Luthi (might be biased as Luthi is one of my boys and I don't like much at all about Marquez).

I think one of the stand outs for the Moto2 races was Iannone, he raced really well and kept the tyres pretty much the whole race. He inherited 2nd place after Marquez's shove to Luthi but he was up and amongst the front the whole race and was never really going to be off the podium.

Again the grid stayed pretty close together and as always the Moto2 race delivered an action packed race.

I was real happy with my boy Mike di Meglio, who after his 125cc championship has hardly done anything in Moto2. Thankfully he seems to have at least found some form and stayed a consistent 7th race long. It really is about time Mike started to show some form and I'm happy he might finally have a decent Moto2 season.


MotoGP : The race I have been looking forward to all off season, the return of the 1000cc bikes and my Nicky.

The battle up front was contested by Stoner, Lorenzo and surprisingly Pedrosa. Stoner looked like he was going to run away but Lorenzo was able to catch him with Pedrosa following close behind. In the end Lorenzo got the win (to make it a Spanish triple for the weekend) followed by Dani with Stoner in 3rd.

Lower down the grid Bradl made a spectacular debut into the top class staying behind the two fighting Tech3 machines for most of the race and only falling to 8th in the closing stages.

The Tech3's had a race long battle which ended up with Cal Crutchlow leading home Dovi.

The Ducati's disappointed and seem to have stalled totally this season. Nicky qualified well enough (Rossi was in 12th) but from the start of the race he started going backwards and fast. Nicky did then fight back to a 7th place finish, but it was a close one and not where Ducati wanted to be. Valentino was very upset by the whole race which just saw the Ducati lack any kind of anything.

The race like a lot of MotoGP races recently actually wasn't as interesting as it could have been and nowhere near as interesting as the Moto2 race. But it still beat the F1 races in many ways for me.

Not only was it nice to see the MotoGP back it was nice to see the fighting spirit of Nicky and see him yo-yo around the grid. Not that I want him to have a tough time but I like to see him overtaking and proving people wrong. Nicky is worth so much more than his critics give him.

I feel real sorry for Valentino who really just is struggling.

And it must have been one of the most miserable podiums to ever start the season with the three moaning Minnies on the podium.



Over all :

My driver of the whole weekend would probably be Fenati, brilliant debut for the young Italian.

I felt most sorry all weekend for possibly Valentino but also Luthi.
Vale just couldn't get anything out of his Ducati.
As for Luthi he went nose to nose with the public darling and the majority of fans/media after the race where totally on Marquez's side (OMG he had a eye operation and missed all of testing and he won the race! Because its not like he doesn't test his bike every other day anyway is it?) but just because someone is overtaking you doesn't mean you can't fight it and Luthi wasn't on a normal racing line and was just driven clear off the track being left no room to do anything! Marquez is a very dirty racing driver and I'm not sure why when others get lambasted by the likes of Lorenzo for being less dirty but maybe a little more wild Marquez is thought of as some kind of genius.

All in all a brilliant start to the new MotoGP season and can't believe I have to wait 3 whole weeks. THREE WEEKS! to the next race.

COME ON #69!!!

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