MotoGP – Phillip Island – Eighth place in the sprint for Tamada

Over forty thousand fans were present today at Phillip Island to watch the fifteenth MotoGP round of the season. It was an ideal day for the race, with already spring weather. Makoto Tamada started quite well, managing to maintain ninth position for the first five laps. The Konica Minolta Honda Team rider seems to be able to do well and for the first few laps he manages to lap at a pace of 1'31" not far from the best, taking eighth place on the sixth lap against the Spanish rider Toni Elias.

From the tenth lap, however, Makoto lost his initial pace, allowing the pursuers Nakano and Elias himself to recover lap after lap, until starting a gripping battle for seventh place, fought for all four final laps. At this point in the race Elias and Makoto pass each other several times, while Nakano follows a short distance away. During the last lap, the Kawasaki rider manages to overtake his two contenders, and Tamada only has the chance to regain eighth place in the final sprint, a thousandth of a second ahead of Elias.

The Konica Minolta Honda Team rider maintains eleventh position in the world rankings. There are no breaks for MotoGP, in 5 days everyone will be on track in Istanbul for the first Turkish Grand Prix in the history of the MotoGP.

Luca Montiron

“Performance below our expectations after the two positive days of testing that Makoto had conducted. Today Makoto was affected by the lack of confidence he had with the front tyre, particularly in the fast left turns of the Australian circuit. The team hasn't changed anything since the warm up, but our driver suffered from this problem and tried to finish the race without being able to make the slightest attack. The only consolation is having scored a few points which I hope will help us enter the top ten of the final ranking.”

Makoto Tamada

“I was satisfied with my start, but at a certain point I started to lose the optimal feeling with the front tyre. I couldn't push as hard as I did in practice, particularly in the left corners. In the last laps it was really hard to manage to stay close to Toni and Shinya. In the end, the way things went, the eighth position achieved in the photo finish may have suited me well, but from Istanbul I really hope to improve. I know that thanks to the technical package at my disposal and my qualities I can do more.”

Konica Minolta Honda